IT Help Desk KPI Series 5: Average Cost of Work Order
definition
The average cost of a work order refers to the total monthly operating cost of IT support divided by the number of work orders.
aims
Keep the cost of each work order to a minimum.
Base cost per work order
According to MetricNet, the following is the baseline cost of each work order in 2014.
Industry standard-cost per work order in a high-density environment
Industry standard-cost per work order in a medium-density environment
It can be seen from these two situations that the cost of a service request is usually higher than the cost of an incident. This is because events usually take less time than service requests. Therefore, the cost of each work order is largely affected by the mixture of events and service requests.
In most enterprise organizations, IT support is seen as a cost center, and during a financial downturn, IT support is often the first to cut budgets. But even so, IT support must remain efficient. The cost of each work order is a key service desk performance indicator that helps IT support staff analyze the efficiency of processing work orders within a given budget. The goal is always to maintain the best cost level for each work order.
Work order cost and user satisfaction
Remember that the average cost of each work order is higher than average is not necessarily a bad thing, and the average cost of each work order is not always a good thing, as shown in the figure below.
The scenario depicted in this figure may mean that the IT service desk team is trading off service quality to reduce the cost of each work order, which usually leads to lower customer satisfaction.
In the above figure, the increase in the cost of each work order is accompanied by an increase in the level of customer satisfaction. This may mean that each increase in work order results in better service delivery and justifies the extra cost.
Techniques to control the cost of work orders
A key factor in optimizing the cost of each work order is the ability to quickly resolve work orders and reduce any unnecessary upgrades. By following the following points, you can control the cost of each work order:
· Analyze service request patterns to plan the purchase of assets and licenses in advance, thereby reducing the time required to close service requests.
· Identify peaks and valleys to optimize resource management and technical staff workload.
· Properly categorize and prioritize tickets to reduce erroneous ticket assignments, thereby helping to resolve issues quickly.
· Establish a rich knowledge base.
About ServiceDesk Plus
ServiceDesk Plus is ITIL-based service desk software that helps you manage all communications from a single point. It provides integrated request management (fault notification), asset management , purchase order management, contract management, self-service portal, knowledge base, and work order management . ServiceDesk Plus has more than 100,000 customers in 185 countries/regions and is available in more than 30 different languages.
About ManageEngine
ManageEngine is an internationally renowned brand specializing in the development and sales of IT management software under Zoho Corporation. It provides services worldwide and has branches in the United States, India, Japan and China. ManageEngine provides IT management tools to help IT teams meet the organization's growing service and support needs. Traditional and emerging enterprises worldwide (including more than 60% of the Fortune 500 companies) are using ManageEngine products to support the best performance of their critical IT infrastructure (including networks, servers, applications, desktops, etc.).