Mobile working Toolkit

Facing the challenge of an expanding remote user base

Tags:
Remote,
Network

Deb Shinder Tech Republic

Published: 09 Oct 2006 15:40 BST

As your organisation grows, it's likely that more of your network's users will work from remote locations: salespeople who take their laptops on the road, executives who need to log on from hotels or home, telecommuters who do all their work off-site, and so forth. Thus it becomes an important function of your tech support department to provide assistance to these remote users.

Even if all your employees do all their work on company property, as the company expands it becomes more difficult for support personnel to personally visit the desks of users who have software problems. Those users may be on a different floor or in a different building from the IT staff, or even at a branch office located across town or across the country.

So how do you provide help in the most efficient and cost-effective way when faced with the challenge of remote users? Let's look some of the more common solutions, and their advantages and disadvantages.

Telephone support
The traditional method for supporting users remotely is over the phone. Until recently, this was the way most help desks operated. Some users are comfortable with this model and may be able to communicate their problems coherently in a one-to-one voice conversation.

However, there are some major drawbacks. The support person is severely handicapped by being unable to see what's going on, having to rely on the user to describe every action he takes, every dialogue box, and so on.

The cost of using the phone to provide support is another issue worth considering — especially when the remote users are located in a different city, state, or country. Long-distance charges can add up. If telephone support to distant users is necessary, the company should consider implementing voice over IP (VoIP) to lower the cost.

Even when long-distance charges aren't involved, telephone support ties up lines within the organisation that could be used for other purposes.

Computer-based remote assistance
Using the IP network to provide assistance can lower cost and make the experience less frustrating and more productive for both support personnel and users. There are several different ways to do so.

Email/IM assistance
The most basic form of computer-based remote assistance involves using email or instant messaging applications for communications between support personnel and users.

The advantages of using either of these methods instead of the phone include:

No long-distance charges
Ability to exchange files; for example, the user can send screenshots of the problem to support personnel, or the support person can send scripts or files the user can run to automatically fix some problems
One support person may be able to simultaneously deal with multiple users, something that's almost impossible with phone support

The biggest disadvantage of email is that responses may not be immediate. The lag can result in lost productivity as the user waits for instructions, and the support person can't troubleshoot as effectively with long lags between communications.

For that reason, an IM program is usually preferable. One advantage is that many IM applications allow you to talk by voice (if the computers have the appropriate hardware), giving you the advantages of telephone communications along with the visual element and low cost.

Web-based assistance
Another way to provide assistance over the Internet is through a Web site. The assistance Web site can range from simple Help pages to an interactive site by which users can chat with support personnel in real time about their problems. It can also take the form of a discussion board, where questions…