DattoCon is Coming Soon! Better Develop a Triage Mindset FIRST.
Over the past few months, many great organizations have had MSP events with lots of education, networking...and vendors. Many of those vendors were extolling the virtues of their products and how they can solve all the problems in the MSP universe.
And many MSP execs came home with several of those products in their pockets. But one thing many MSP owners don’t often think about when buying new tools is the current state of their shop back home.
The Right Foundation for a Service Delivery Team
In a Chaos-filled MSP, new tools (even great ones) will rarely solve the problems and bring about the peace, happiness, and profitability that having a well-designed Service Delivery process can bring. A Service Delivery team built on the right foundation means having a Triage Mindset - AND a Service Coordinator.
The #1 responsibility of a Service Coordinator is to take ownership of all open tickets and drive them from New to Complete.
A deeper perspective is needed regarding the Triage step in the intake process. While the #1 perspective is to drive all open tickets from new to complete, at the Triage step, the deeper perspective is “How to set the plate for the Techs, so they can efficiently engage and disengage on the engagement.”
This means making sure the ticket has all the facts - and nothing but the facts -pertaining to the engagement. It also means properly coding the ticket, especially in the areas of Workflow and Assignment. And last, but not least, ensuring all the information has been gathered and the Tech has everything they need to complete the engagement outside of a business context conversation with the Client.
MSP Life would be easy if all we did were incidents.
We are very good at break/fix engagements. If all we did were break/fix, dumping the request (ticket) into a queue and asking the Techs to figure it out would work 90% of the time.
But there’s a problem: we don’t just do break/fix. That is why a high-quality intake process is needed - and having a Triage mindset is critical to driving Chaos out of the work environment.
Our experience shows that 80% of the Chaos can be driven out of the work environment with a good intake process. When Advanced Global started the Service Delivery Foundational Improvement program, it was logical to start with improving the intake process and then working our way through the Client Journey from New to Complete - guiding MSPs on how to improve one milestone at a time.
Much to our amazement, we found if we improved the intake process, the Tech Engagement and Resolve SLAs would improve organically. That is why more than half of our articles focus on the Service Coordinator role and tools.
The Service Coordinator is the key to a well-run Service Delivery Team and the Most Valuable Employee, bar none.
The facts and nothing but the facts:
The Triage process starts with the description. The tendency is to read the description, figure out what is needed, and move on. This does a major disservice to everyone on the Team that comes after the initial reviewer.
A smarter way would be to delete all the information out of the description that is not relevant to the request—things like everything that comes after the name in the signature.
Contact info is available in the right (Insight Panel) nav; no one reads the disclaimers, and who cares about mission statements and other marketing gibberish (sorry, Cassidy)?
While it is nice to be friendly in emails, and I like to start with something personal, this type of conversation does not belong in the matter at hand and should be deleted.
The From:/To: information is unimportant. The From should be the contact in the ticket, the date stamp is when the ticket was created, and the CC are the Additional Contacts, and all of this is in the email thread attached to the ticket. So, none of this information is needed in the description.
What is needed in the description is the facts of the request - and nothing but the facts. The less information in the description, the faster the Techs can read it, grasp what needs to be done, engage and complete the request.
The ticket title should be a summary of the description. It should immediately tell the Tech what needs to be done, without any when (urgent, help, immediately, etc.) information. That will be in the SLA.
It is always good practice to verify that the ticket is for the right Client and not yourself and that the Contact and Additional Contacts information are there and correct.
With this, we now have the facts and nothing but the facts (ma’am).
Workflows, Assignment, etc.:
Now what? At the heart of a good intake process is knowing which of the 11 Service Delivery Workflows or several non-Service Delivery Workflows (Procurement, Post Sales, Billing, etc.) the request should be put in, so the request flows from New to Complete in the most efficient manner.
It is critical that a good Service Coordinator is fluent in all 11 Workflows and has internalized when to use which one. As their #1 responsibility is to drive all open tickets from new to complete, they need to fully understand each milestone in each workflow. This knowledge allows them to think deeper into what the best workflow is and not just take the Client’s description (Critical - PC Install – because the Employee is starting today) at face value and respond accordingly.
When it comes to assignments, nothing is more useful than a skill sheet. The technology stack of supported devices and applications is across the top, with each Tech listed down the side. Then in the cell where the row crosses the column, put:
Champion – the person responsible for following the vendor and bringing major release info back to the Team in the form of LnLs. They are also the go-to person for any questions or engagement challenges with the device or application.
Advanced – capable of installing any version of the device or application
Intermediate - capable of installing any simple version of the device or application
Basic – capable of remediating and maintaining the device or application
{Blank} – do not assign them the ticket under any circumstances
Training – looking for shadowing opportunities to grow their career to the next level
There are a whole host of other fields…
…most of which can be automated. Issue and Sub-Issue are fields that merit further discussion. The default (Triage Automated) Issue and Sub-Issue are TBD.
Require the Techs to change the Issue and Sub-Issue from TBD to something else when they complete the ticket. They can be held accountable via WFR. The reasoning behind having a Triage TBD Issue and Sub-Issue is that a significant number of times, the Service Coordinator is guessing, along with every Tech that touches the ticket.
Only the Tech completing the engagement knows what the Issue and Sub-Issue were. Therefore, the best time to capture the Issue and Sub-Issue is at the time of completion. Please email us if you disagree.
Request for Information:
I am unsure what percentage of times a Client sends in a thin request like, “Help, I need someone,” or one with even less information. I do know that this happens way too much and wastes too much time.
A speed code sending the Client a note asking for more information is the most efficient way to communicate. The speed code can be pre-populated with the most common questions, and then the notification can be edited before sending. The notification is fully branded and calls out why the Client is receiving the email.
The status is Request for Information until the Client Responds, and then the status is changed to Return to Triage so the Service Coordinator can pick up the ticket and complete the Triage process.
It is a good idea to have a feedback loop from the Techs back to the Service Coordinator whenever information is missing from the post-Triage ticket. This way, the speed code, and the Service Coordinator can improve, and request the information the next time it is missing.
Daily QC reporting:
To aid in improving the intake process, a daily QC report of all the tickets created that day – especially the ones still open, should be created and reviewed. When reviewing the post-Triage tickets, look for a good clean description, concise title, right Resource, and any hiccups along the way (multiple Techs, multiple engagements, missed SLA, Waiting …, Etc.)
Summary:
Despite all the efforts to automate the intake process, this is not possible for MSPs. It takes a good Service Coordinator and lots of gray matter to process the limited information available, fill in the missing information from experience and then navigate the complex MSP Service Delivery Environment landscape to complete the mission: Taking full ownership of all open tickets and driving them from new to complete.
It sounds simple: just Triage any new (or return to Triage) tickets. But the process, know-how and experience are anything but simple – it takes having a Triage mindset.
That is why the benefits of having a great Service Coordinator are huge. A good, well-trained Service Coordinator will allow the Techs to be 10% more efficient, which means growing the top line Managed Services or Project revenue by 10% without increasing the expenses to deliver the additional revenue.
DattoCon is coming soon, and that room full of vendors will have some great deals. Better hurry and develop a Triage Mindset before that next new tool shows up on the credit card. Not enough time? No worries - drop us a line, and we can help.
The elephant in the room:
Who is Advanced Global, and why should we listen to them?
Recently someone we’ve been in communication with since DattoCon 2018, who was faithfully reading our articles, commented that up until a few months ago, “I really did not know what Advanced Global does.” So here are a few bullet points to let anyone interested know who we are and what we do:
We Are – the Autotask Global Service Delivery Authority
We Help – MSPs thrive
We Solve – Service Delivery issues, inefficiencies, and challenges by making sure:
Techs know what to work on next
Someone is managing all open tickets and driving them to completion
The staffing levels are correct, and the workload is balanced
Real-Time Time Entry is a cultural habit
The Client has a great client experience
Profit is maximized
Autotask is being fully leveraged
The historical data that is in the Autotask software is accessible to benchmark, track & USE effectively
The Service Delivery operations can scale
Projects are completed On-Time and On-Budget
The Company can grow
MSPs know what they don’t know
Our Tools:
Autotask “Best in Class” standard build
Our MSP robust Service Delivery SOP library
Advanced Live Reports
Expertise in providing a transformational experience
Note: We are not philosophers; we are doers with 31+ years of Service Delivery experience, bringing real Service Delivery Improvement change, profitability and Best in Class performance.
We start by offering a FREE No-Obligation PSA Configuration Evaluation.