a+ certification jobs near me

 The debate continues among IT professionals about the value of certifications, but a survey of 700 professionals by SolarWinds could put things in their place. Among those who have earned certifications,  most have seen a significant boost in their careers as a result.

According to the survey, which was conducted in conjunction with our sister publication Network World, 60% of those interviewed said that a certification allowed them to obtain a new job; 50% got a raise - of which 40% said the raise was greater than 10% due to their certification; and 29% earned them a promotion.

Respondents also offered suggestions on when to get certified and which ones. Interestingly, they considered Cisco certifications the most valuable.

Half of the participants said they obtained certifications to obtain a promotion or to be eligible for a new job. On the other hand, since three-quarters of them had certifications, it means that a quarter (25%) didn't see much value in them. “I don't have certifications. I don't have a master's degree. I have held network and hardware administrator / engineer positions for over ten years without a single role related to that area. You learn as you go, which is better than learning in a stupid classroom, ”commented one survey participant.

But his case is a minority. Even network professionals who earn the highest salaries - topping $ 110,000 a year - had as many or more certifications as those with the lowest salaries.

This is not to say that certifications themselves are solely responsible for these high salaries. Those who earn more also have more years of experience (75% were over ten years old) and more traditional education (25% had a master's degree, compared to 11% in the lower-wage groups).

But even so, among the highest paid IT professionals who had certifications, 58% said a certification had not paid them back in salary increases or bonuses, 63% said they got a promotion, and 30% allowed them to land a new job. These figures are similar to those in the lowest salary levels, who also surprisingly said that certifications have paid off in salary increases or bonuses (55%), a new job (62%) or a promotion (27%) .

On the other hand, the survey also revealed that Cisco certifications are the most popular, according to 67% of the participants who have a certification. 44% of those who earn more than $ 110,000 a year had a CCIE certification. Among those with the lowest wages, only 4% did. 39% had Microsoft certifications, and nearly a quarter had a CompTIA Network +.

In fact, according to respondents, Cisco certifications were considered the most valuable because they are the ones that have opened the doors to more promotions, new jobs or pay increases than any other. But, interestingly, for some others Cisco certifications were also considered among the not so valuable. “I believe that network certifications are the most valuable when coupled with practical experience. I wouldn't have held my last two spots without that, ”said one participant.

Likewise, security certifications have gained relevance. A third of respondents had one, the most common being CompTIA Security +. Among those surveyed with salaries over $ 110,000 a year, 38% had security certifications, particularly the CCSP. By comparison, only 9% of those making less than $ 110,000 had CCSP, but 32% had CompTIA Security +.

The least popular certifications were for network management technology - only 17% of 700 respondents had one.

Certifications for Linux and Systems Management / Virtualization were in the mid-range for popularity and value a+ certification job opportunities.

The least popular were certifications involving virtualization technology from Citrix and Red Hat.

Seventy-seven percent of those surveyed said they choose to get certified just to learn the technology, not to earn more money. While none claim that a certification is more valuable than practical experience, it can be helpful when new technology is implemented.

Objectives of an ITSM Service Desk

 It is important to differentiate between what is the Traditional Help Desk (which we talked about in the previous point) and what is Help Desk in the Management of Information Technology Services ( IT Service Management , ITSM) service desk role.

To avoid confusion, this last variable is usually called the Service Desk.

A Traditional Help Desk is limited in terms of incident management, support and provision. In other words, its functions are basic compared to an ITSM Service Desk .

ITSM serves a strategic vision that adds value to the company, and it does so through IT solutions in which it integrates people, processes and technology.

ITSM contributes to making the connection between IT and the strategy that an organization considers.

Specifically, the strategy proposed by ITSM helps organizations measure the impact of IT on their business processes. That is why we speak of an evolved Help Desk, that is, an IT Service Desk (service desk ).

Objectives of an ITSM Service Desk

An IT Service Desk focuses on business requirements, attends to the implementation of the IT process, monitoring and continuous improvement, in addition to solving existing problems.

It can be said that the IT Service Desk is reactive and proactive. It is reactive because it fulfills the functionality of what the Help Desk is as an incident and event management unit, but it is also proactive when applying the practices of continuous improvement of services, such as those proposed by the ITIL ( IT Infrastructure Library ).

it service desk job description

 Service Desk owns the incident management process

In ITIL 2011, the service desk owns the Incident Management process and is responsible for resolving incidents based on service level agreements with the goal of restoring services as quickly as possible and getting the customer back. to work. ITIL service desk responsibilities that are associated with incident management include:

Incident Management Support - Service desk administrators must ensure that the proper tools, processes, and skills are maintained across the service desk team to ensure timely and effective handling of incidents. Without proper support, the efficiency and performance of this ITIL service desk process is significantly reduced.

Incident Recording and Categorization : Service desk analysts are expected to maintain an accurate and up-to-date record of each reported incident, including the category / type of incident. Incidents should be organized and prioritized based on the level of disruption they cause. A service desk must properly allocate its resources for handling the most critical incidents.

Incident Resolution - Service Desk Analysts typically play the first-level support role within the IT organization - they are the ones answering the phone or responding to your message when you first contact IT, and your goal is always to resolve the incident on the first call and restore service as quickly as possible. In cases where it is impossible for a first level support provider to resolve the problem immediately, the incident can be transferred to a second level support analyst or a service desk supervisor.

Incident Resolution - Level 2 : Service Desk Supervisors have responsibilities beyond resolving escalated incidents, such as taking action themselves. External support is sometimes referred to as 3rd level support - a service desk supervisor must be able to understand the problem and find the right expert who can provide a timely resolution it service desk job description .

Major Incident Handling - Some incidents are classified as major incidents, which means they cause massive business disruption and must be addressed immediately. When this happens, the service desk must react by quickly escalating the issue, recruiting third-level support if necessary, and issuing timely communications and status updates to users. Once again, the main goal of the service desk in a major incident is to establish a solution and restore service as quickly as possible.

Incident Management Reports - If the organization has a problem management process in place, most of the information it receives about problems will be sent to the service desk. When an incident is reported, service desk personnel work on the problem and manage escalations until a workaround is found. In cases where a workaround is found, but the error is not fully understood, the service desk team reports the incident to Problem Management, where the PM team will perform a root cause analysis and find a definitive solution for the incident.

IT organizations that want to efficiently meet these processes and the additional ITIL requirements often implement service desk software such  as Cherwell® Service Management. Our ITSM toolkit meets the requirements of 11 ITIL processes, including incident management and request fulfillment. It also helps automate some of the more tedious tasks associated with ITIL compliance, such as automatically generating incident and request logs.

help desk roles and responsibilities

 

ROLES AND RESPONSIBILITIES IN A SERVICE DESK

A couple of years ago we started an implementation of a Service Desk for a company in the finance industry. They had a Service Desk for several years, but they could not bring it to the level they needed; they lacked relevant measurements, suffered from high staff turnover, low quality of services ... In short, it was a Service Desk that simply did not meet the expectations of the business or users. In desperation, they decided to tender the service with external providers and our company was selected as a new provider.

When implementing new services, we typically begin by evaluating the operation as we found it. During this evaluation, we analyze indicators, documentation and we sit down to talk and take notes with personnel involved in the operation of the service to be implemented. On this occasion, the documentation appeared to be correct and complete, some of the causes of the deficiencies were not apparent until the interviews.

As I sat down to chat with the service manager, I noticed that the service was not suffering from lack of interest on their part or negligence. On the contrary, he seemed to be a very professional person and interested in the success of his area. He had a lot of accumulated frustration because he felt that no matter how much effort he put in, things were not due as the business expected and all the pressure of the results of the IT department tended to fall on his area.

Read: 5 Common Sins in Managing a Service Desk

He explained to me that management expected that, as the Service Desk leader , he would be able to align the rest of the organization to best practices for service delivery (whatever that meant). However, try as he might, he hadn't been able to advance. The resolution areas did not pay attention to the services, they were not concerned about the satisfaction of the users and in general they did not see the Service Desk as an ally, but as an enemy help desk roles and responsibilities.

As he talked to me about the different scenarios that he came to experience over the years, I began to understand one of the main causes of the low success of the Service Desk: At the organizational level, the responsibilities of the roles exceeded the authority they had.

THE MOST VALUABLE “P” IN IT: PEOPLE

ITIL tells us that every service is made up of 4 elements called: The 4 P's of Service design (or the 4 P's of ITIL). These are: Products, Process, Partners and People. Of the 4, People are recognized as the most valuable element in an organization and its services.

People refers to human capital, which is also the only organizational asset that has both concrete and abstract capabilities. Concrete because they can physically interact with other elements such as computers, and abstract because they support and apply organizational knowledge.

Unfortunately, despite being the most important asset in any organization, human capital tends to lack proper management in many IT organizations where our primary focus is on technology. The best practices of Service Management help us to establish the relationships that human capital has with the technological services offered by IT departments .

it help desk roles and responsibilities

It fulfills all the functions of a Help Desk.

It allows planning, structuring and providing the delivery of IT services.

It is the central and single point of contact between users and ITSM it help desk roles and responsibilities.

Helps restore service to the user with minimal impact and generates reports.

It includes a catalog that defines what resources and processes are needed for each service.

It allows the service to be requested by the user.

Use satisfaction surveys and KPIs ( key performance indicator r - key performance indicator ).

Provides support to all departments of the organization under the name of enterprise service management ( business service management ).

 

service desk definition

 A Help Desk or Help Desk is a tool that organizations use to provide assistance or advice to clients in response to a particular request. It aims to provide information and technical solutions to customers.

 

Normally, Help Desks are made up of groups of technicians; who are in charge of using their specialized knowledge to find the solutions that best answer the questions or requests of the clients. This process of seeking and providing solutions is divided into two levels according to the complexity of the request:

 Level 1

This level handles common situations where the customer simply requests more information about a product or service. At this stage, the hotline is responsible for identifying needs and providing advice.

 Level 2

Here the level of complexity of the requests increases. Requests at this level typically require the technician to assist the customer in a more personalized way either through phone support or through On-site support.

 

Help Desks offer quick and practical solutions to customers; they also represent a point of contact between the company and the consumer. This point of contact serves not only to solve problems but also to motivate customer loyalty with the brand service desk definition.

 The Service Desk

The Service Desk or Service Desk is also responsible for responding to customer requests, in fact it can do almost everything a Help Desk does. However, its functions go much further.

Based on this set of best practices, the Service Desk also adopts a preventive approach that allows it to anticipate incidents; and create strategies that are oriented to optimize the infrastructure of the IT ecosystem within the company.

it help desk job description

 It fulfills all the functions of a Help Desk it help desk job description.

It allows planning, structuring and providing the delivery of IT services.

It is the central and single point of contact between users and ITSM.

Helps restore service to the user with minimal impact and generates reports.

It includes a catalog that defines what resources and processes are needed for each service.

It allows the service to be requested by the user.

Use satisfaction surveys and KPIs ( key performance indicator r - key performance indicator ).

Provides support to all departments of the organization under the name of enterprise service management ( business service management ).