Forrester: IT Help Could be Better

According to a new report from Forrester Research, most IT users are not
satisfied with their company’s IT support, and users are “less than
satisfied with their relationships with their IT departments.”

Forrester surveyed 2,000 IT business users as part of the survey “How
Do Users Feel About Technology?” At the bottom of the list in terms of
user satisfaction came IT help desk support Adding insult to injury, help
desk users also ranked it last in terms of how important the technology is
to their jobs.

According to the survey results, frequency of use also contributes to
lower user satisfaction, with more use equaling less satisfaction.

The root
cause of user issues with the help desk is not necessarily related to the
courtesy (or lack thereof) from help desk personnel. Rather it is the
inability to resolve help desk requests on the first attempt, as well as the
promptness of updates that underlies help desk dissatisfaction.

The help desk isn’t the only area with limited user satisfaction. Company
intranets were viewed as difficult mediums from which to find information. Sixty-one percent said the area of the company intranet that needs the most
improvement is its search capabilities. And only 44 percent indicated it was easy to find what they were looking for on an intranet.

Overall, less than 50 percent of respondents were not satisfied with their IT
department’s communications about new technology updates and organization
changes.

Forrester’s survey also looked at how users rated their satisfaction with
desktop technologies. PC reliability and software usability were the
highest ranking items in the desktop category in terms of user satisfaction.
Seventy-five percent were satisfied with their existing e-mail/calendar application.

The survey base was comprised mostly of Microsoft and Dell users
with 49 percent using a Dell PC and 65 percent using Microsoft’s Outlook
for e-mail and calendar.