Summary:

• Unresolved IT issues can cost you hundreds per minute. Creating categories and priority tags for support requests helps IT handle the most critical problems first.

• Giving employees access to a living knowledge base can equip them to solve common problems on their own. This reduces ticket volume and boosts confidence.

• Initial and ongoing training helps end users and IT staff use tools efficiently. Including soft skills and certifications to improve service quality across the board adds value to the experience for both the person taking the course and the business.

• Help desk software with built-in automation, tracking, and collaboration tools streamlines workflows and improves resolution times. It's important to choose a tool that matches the size of your team, your needs, and your budget.

• Use feedback loops and SLAs to refine your support processes and set clear expectations. These practices create accountability and build trust across your organization.

Downtime costs the average business up to $9,000 per minute—and losses like these can add up fast if they aren't handled in a timely manner. IT help desks give people a quick, easy way to report problems and get them resolved before day-to-day operations take a hit.

With the global IT services market now surpassing $1 trillion in spending each year, businesses clearly understand the need for skilled support. But just assigning someone to answer tickets, chats, emails, and calls is rarely enough.

To get the most value from your managed IT support services, follow the six essential IT help desk best practices below—curated by the team of experts at Revotech.

1. Categorize & Prioritize Requests

It doesn't take long for help desk workflows to get chaotic without the right guardrails in place. Like a hospital emergency room, every issue must be triaged for severity and assigned to the right people or response times can slow to a crawl. 

Adding tags for factors like request type, source, and urgency makes triage easier. It also ensures you have eyes on any high-risk, high-impact issues or IT projects first.

Steps to Implementation:

• Start by defining your ticket categories (e.g., hardware, software, network, access).

• Add at least four clear priority or triage levels (e.g., low, moderate, high, critical).

• Set up routing rules/inboxes so requests automatically go to the right place.

• Monitor the categorization system closely and adjust it as your business grows.

This simple structure will shorten resolution times and ease bottlenecks that slow down resolution times so people can work more confidently without worrying about the next crisis.

Read More: The Top 8 Benefits of Getting Remote IT Support

2. Create a Knowledge Base

Knowledge bases are dynamic sites that live online or on your company's intranet. They're designed to give people the ability to quickly find answers or create their own solutions without needing to call the help desk. This lowers the volume of tickets in the system at any given time and helps employees feel more empowered and in control.

Steps to Implementation:

• Identify team members with deep knowledge about systems and tools.

• Ask them to collaborate on clear, step-by-step guides and knowledge entries.

• Include visuals like screenshots, short videos, FAQs, and flow charts.

• Make it searchable via keywords, categories, or boolean logic.

Think of a knowledge base as your team’s collective brain. It's a self-serve option people can turn to instead of sending in a ticket—or while they wait for a response.

Tip: Don't have anyone on staff who has the time or experience to help you develop a knowledge base? Let's talk about how we can help you recruit the right person for the job.

3. Make Training Available

People can't use the systems and tools available to them effectively if they never receive any training on them. In fact, a lack of training is one of the biggest contributors to low user adoption rates and effectively becomes a technological paperweight.

Continuous training keeps help desk personnel and end users up-to-date, but it also gives them the skills they need to use tools and systems effectively. This lowers the number of tickets that stem from gaps in knowledge or simple misunderstandings.

Steps to Implementation:

• Start at the beginning by creating onboarding materials for new hires.

• Hold workshops or refreshers on tools, systems, trends, and procedures often.

• Include soft skills on topics like communication, empathy, and conflict resolution.

• Offer certifications from third-party organizations, like Microsoft, where possible.

An informed team delivers better service, but training is also inherently beneficial to individual employees and help desk technicians. Each course or workshop they attend helps them work more efficiently and makes them more valuable to the company, too.

4. Leverage Advanced Help Desk Software

Modern help desk software boosts efficiency, improves accountability, and streamlines workflows to make the more efficient and effective. This lets teams focus on resolving the issue or collaboration with the requester instead of constantly micromanaging tasks or processes behind the scenes. 

You'll find a few of the most common help desk platforms in the chart below. Each offers something a little different, from remote tools to AI-driven process automation.

Steps to Implementation:

• Choose software that integrates with your existing tools whenever possible.

• Use automation and AI-driven features to triage tickets and send out updates.

• Track KPIs like response times, resolution times, and ticket volumes at all times.

• Activate internal note or comment features to document any changes/solutions.                             

• Open Agent-to-Agent chat rooms or let them create groups for peer support.

At Revotech, we can also help you procure the hardware to run software platforms like these at an affordable rate. See our Hardware-as-a-Service (HaaS) offerings for more info.

5. Use Feedback for Continuous Improvement

Workflows, training, and support protocols aren't static—they should change over time to meet the needs of the business or the people who use your help desk. Collect feedback from end users early and often, then use it to find areas for improvement.

Steps to Implementation:

• Send out a quick post-ticket satisfaction survey after every exchange.

• Review all feedback, both positive and negative, with help desk personnel regularly.

• Watch closely for recurring themes like repeat issues or trends.

• Implement feasible suggestions and track the results.

• Communicate any changes back to users to close the loop.

A strong feedback process bridges the gap between IT and the rest of the organization. It also builds trust and reminds everyone that the person on the end of the ticket, screen, or telephone call is a real human being who has the same ultimate goal.

6. Create & Manage SLAs

Service Level Agreements (SLAs) set clear standards for service delivery and legally define factors like help desk availability and response ties. These benchmarks prevent both sides from making unrealistic demands and help mitigate any risks associated with outsourcing IT.

Steps to Implementation:

• First, consult a lawyer about the language in your SLA.

• Set targets based on issue type and priority (e.g., failure vs. bug).

• Make sure SLAs are sent out and clearly explained to everyone they will affect.

• Set up monitoring or help desk software to alert administrators about breaches.

• Review and adjust the standards in your SLAs quarterly or yearly as required.

It's easy to think of SLAs as just more fine print no one reads, but this is short-sighted. When everyone knows what to expect, all sides can work together harmoniously.

Have your own in-house IT team? At Revotech, we're happy to collaborate with them on targets like these or co-manage your IT. Use our experts as a fall-back or to take the weight off them so they can focus on improving your infrastructure instead.  

The Impact of Following IT Help Desk Best Practices

When your help desk follows these six best practices, people at every level feel the difference long-term. Employees get the help they need reliably and consistently, the constantly-growing backlog of tech problems starts to shrink, and your IT team finally has the bandwidth to start working on proactive or strategic IT solutions.

But there's an even more important takeaway: these best practices help contribute to a culture of continuous learning, accountability, and improvement. They see how feedback leads to real, actionable change, so they stop avoiding it and start leaning into it instead.

See These Best Practices at a Glance:

Take IT Help Desk Services Further With Revotech

We've all had that moment where we're at work or trying out a new system when suddenly, chaos strikes. The software refuses to boot up, the server shuts itself down, or it won't even turn on in the first place.

Problems like these shouldn't strike fear in the hearts of customers, staff, managers, or administrators. Revotech's managed IT and help desk services ensure they always have someone to reach out who knows how to fix the problem—or at least who to call.

Don't leave your employees to scramble for answers on their own. Make Revotech your IT help desk partner and enjoy the peace of mind, efficiency, and productivity that comes with having a full team of experts by your side. Schedule a free discovery call right now.