The first and most immediate interaction between your company and your customers will come at the service desk. In many organizations these positions are considered entry-level positions. While this may be true, given the importance of that first impression, it would be extremely valuable for your organization to consider a certification program for you helpdesk employees.

There are a number of routes organizations can take to getting their helpdesk employees certified. You should first and foremost research into what helpdesk certification actually is and means. In most cases, companies that provide helpdesk certification offer courses in Helpdesk Etiquette, technical etiquette, computer skills required for helpdesk operators, helpdesk terminology and best helpdesk practices. Or, some version of that skill-set. What is essential is that they also offer an exam that verifies the certification information learned and also adds some credibility to the entire process.

An avenue that I have consulted business in pursuing is a helpdesk certification train-the-trainer program. By that, I mean that your business choose your senior (or who will be your senior) helpdesk personnel to take part in a formal helpdesk certification course. They then come back and develop a helpdesk training program for the entire organization based on what they took part in and learned. What this gives you is an extremely cost effective helpdesk training program that is also tailored to meet the requirements of your organization. Also, having your own personnel develop and deliver the training re-enforces the material. In the end, this will develop very senior and knowledgeable helpdesk staff.

The benefit of having a helpdesk that is certified is many. First and foremost, you will have personnel that completely understand the helpdesk concept and how it should work and support the company. They will be shy to let you know when the company is straying away from the helpdesk mission, or if they don’t think the current structure is supporting that mission. Obliviously, having personnel certified ensures that they are qualified for the job they are doing and are thus, more confident in the job they are doing. Moreover, they will know what skill-sets it is that makes them better helpdesk professionals and, as a result, become aware of the need to constantly improve their active listening and problem solving skills.

You will see that the negotiating skills of you helpdesk staff drastically improve and you will have less and less high stress calls. Your customer – helpdesk interaction will become a more positive experience. Your customers will feel that they are interacting with a real professional that is focused on quickly and efficiently solving their particular problem. Thus, you will have folks that are not only experts in a certain technical aspect of the company but are also experts in being a proficient and valuable helpdesk specialist.

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The IT Infrastructure Library, or ITIL, is a framework for organizations to implement to make sure that their IT services can be delivered effectively and efficiently. It was developed in the 1980s by an agency of the British government, now called the called the Office of Government Commerce (OGC), to help the government better manage its IT infrastructure and save money in the process.

Since 1989, the OGC has issued a series of books on ITIL. Each of the books covers a topic of IT service management.

The core ITIL process have basically stayed the same since v1, however the way they are put together has evolved to meet the ever-changing needs of the organization.

Since v3 was introduced in 2007, many IT service managers have wondered about the key differences between v2 and v3.

For one thing, the library has been consolidated to five new books, each dealing with a phase of the service lifecycle. In ITIL v3, the concept of IT service delivery has been expanded from the day-to-day operations of those services to the following five phases of the service lifecycle:

• Service Strategy: Developing and implementing service management as a business strategy.

• Service Design: Designing the right IT services to support the business strategy.

• Service Transition: Transitioning the new system to production.

• Service Operation: Developing effective services to support operations.

• Continual Service Improvement: Continuing to improve IT services.

For another, while v2 is organized around process, v3 is centered around service and helping IT provide value to the business. Version 3 calls on IT to develop, design and expand IT services based on what’s best for the business. Version 3 is more about making IT a business partner, rather than just a department that provides the technology to support the business. One benefit of v3 is that it closes the gap between the IT organization and the business. In v3, the success of the business depends on its relationship with IT.

Although v2 talked about using IT to save money, it focused on how much the IT services cost, rather than the return on investment realized by integrating IT services with the business needs.

Version 2 also focused on the best practices for incident management, change management, capacity management and configuration management to help companies improve and standardize their data center operations. But while v2 told organizations what to do, it really didn’t explain how to do it. And for some, that just wasn’t good enough.

Version 3, however, provides more specifics on how to reach the goals advocated in v2, including offering examples of various business cases. What v3 does is integrate the different ITIL components much better than v2, making them all equally important.

Version 3 is also less complicated and more easy to understand than v2. Additionally, organizations can customize it to meet their specific business needs. And because v3 provides more structure than v2, organizations can incorporate other best practices and standards like Six Sigma.

ITIL v3, therefore, is a change in mindset from v2. It provides the framework for IT to work more closely with the business so it can design and develop the appropriate services to move the business forward efficiently and effectively. Version 3 is about integrating IT services with the business for the good of the business.

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