New Service Desk Survey Reveals Ease-Of-Use Trumps Itil

New Service Desk Survey Reveals Ease-Of-Use Trumps Itil And Advanced Features

• Survey reveals over half of small and midsized Australian and New Zealand organisations do not consider ITIL a factor during purchase of a service desk solution and while adopted as a guideline, is rarely followed
• Over two-thirds of SMBs recognise that better integration of products leads to a better response, despite 62 percent reporting they have not completed this integration due to cost or technical factors.
• 88 percent of survey respondents report the reputation of corporate IT is impacted by service desk interactions and short-comings

Auckland, New Zealand – June 8, 2011 – Dell KACE today announced the results from a new survey of 114 Australian and New Zealand IT professionals on service desk trends. Conducted by Dimensional Research and commissioned by Dell KACE, the survey revealed only 38% of small and midsized Australasian organisations (SMBs) considered ITIL as a factor during the purchase of their service desk tool, even though almost half indicated having adopted ITIL in some form. As a result, an overwhelming majority, 95%, indicated they either do not adhere to ITIL best practices at all or only use it as a guideline.

Additionally, the survey showed SMB’s preferred ease-of-use over advanced features. Almost all reported integration of service desk with a desktop management tool as beneficial, though most SMBs reported that they did not have an integrated solution.

“Our survey revealed IT departments believe they can achieve increased efficiencies by integrating their service desks with other processes to rapidly provide complete information about the endpoints they service,” said Diane Hagglund, senior research analyst for Dimensional Research and the study’s author. “Although most organisations see the value in integrating their service desk solutions with other systems, few SMBs have been able to implement this important integration.”

Service desk (also commonly referred to as help desk) tools are seen as the face of the IT organisation by employees and interactions and successes with a company’s service desk have become the primary manner that corporate IT is judged. The primary goal of the “Trends With Service Desk Tools: A Survey of IT Professionals” study was to gather data about the current trends in service desk solutions, particularly among SMBs. Although the majority of SMB organisations strive to optimise their service desk by integrating with desktop management, 62% feel cost factors or technical complexity have hampered their ability to make the integration.

Key survey findings include:

• Only 38 percent reported they consider ITIL support when purchasing their service desk solution;
• SMBs ranked ease-of-use higher than advanced features when asked to rank a list of service desk features. Web-based interface was the highest ranked service desk feature;
• 88 percent of survey respondents reported the reputation of corporate IT is significantly impacted by service desk interactions;
• 84 percent reported seeing a benefit in integrating service desk to desktop management tools with 68 percent stating the integration enables faster time-to-resolution;
• 62 percent of SMB’s surveyed reported they have not completed this integration due to cost or technical factors.
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Understanding the needs of IT organizations to optimize their desktop management capabilities, the Dell KACE Systems Management Appliance™ offers an appliance-based approach to service desk that is fully integrated with its asset and configuration management features. The appliance offers advanced functionality to help automate repetitive management tasks as well as provides real-time incident management as end-user issues arise. This integrated approach to processes and incident management reduces errors stemming from manual methods assuring high service levels and end-user satisfaction.

“Our latest research underscores what our customers already say about the importance of the service desk to their overall business success,” said Rob Meinhardt, president and co-founder of Dell KACE. “IT organisations of all sizes are continually graded on how well their ‘tech support’ optimises end-user performance and this research shows reputations are on the line here. The integrated service desk and desktop management capabilities of Dell KACE appliances offer both IT and end-users better performance and faster time to resolution, helping to save IT administrators’ time and their organisations money.”

Survey Methodology:
In April 2011, an independent database of IT professionals world-wide was emailed and invited to participate in a web survey on the topic of trends in service desk tools. A total of 844 respondents completed the survey, including 114 Australian and New Zealand IT professionals. Australasian participants included hands-on IT professionals (25 percent), IT managers (40 percent), IT executives (16 percent) and others. Participants represented a wide range of company size and industry verticals. Respondents were not compensated for participating in this survey except to be offered a copy of the final report. The full global report can be accessed at: https://www.kace.com/resources/Service-Desk-Survey-2011.

To learn even more on the survey findings, join Dell KACE for a free “Service Desk 2011: Trends and Truths” webinar on Thursday, June 9, 2011 at 10:00 am PT/1:00 pm ET. Register at: http://tinyurl.com/3udlt2c.

About Dell
Dell (NASDAQ: DELL) creates, enhances and integrates technology and services customers count on to provide them reliable, long-term value. Dell provides systems-management solutions for customers of all sizes and system complexity. The award-winning Dell KACE family of appliances delivers easy-to-use, comprehensive, and affordable systems management capabilities. For more information, visit www.dell.com/kace or follow the conversation at http://twitter.com/DellKACE.

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