Downloadable document: Site Scope
Context Analysis
We were asked as a class to help redesign the ‘Help Desk’ link on myUMBC as well as the ‘Getting Help’ link located on the OIT homepage. This begins with an in-depth context analysis that will help us explore and anticipate sponsor needs and goals within the structure of the redesigned site. In regards to these two sites, we were given very clear requirements as noted in an interview with both Jack Seuss, Vice President for Information Technology at the university, and Mike Carlin, Director of Infrastructure and Support Services. Mr. Seuss lays out the framework for his goals quite explicitly. He believes that the idea of using an advanced knowledge base and dedicated support infrastructure goes back to early 2000, when Indiana University created an in-depth knowledge base of 5,000-10,000 FAQs (Frequently Asked Questions) within their own support site. This in turn led to a great decrease in students seeking help via their help desk and through their phone support and thus led to faster, timelier support that was achieved by the students. However, even though Indiana University has created this staggering knowledge base, they have not continued to evolve the idea to a community knowledge base. This community experience, where students can write their own entries for various topics, allows student experts in multitudes of fields to contribute to one database of help topics. If even a fraction of the student base contributed information to this knowledge base, it would still be radically larger than the number of full-time support staff that currently tries to maintain the help site. Mr. Seuss proposes this new framework that will allow students to publish their own support base will also allow for a much more streamlined method of finding the necessary info when you need it. In regards to the myUMBC help link, which currently is a temporary stop-gap for students looking for help, both Seuss and Carlin envision this site to be a one-stop shop for all help, ranging from financial aid to student billing to network connections. What once was planned as a physical building can now be moved into virtual space. The main point to both of these sites would be fast, efficient help that would be driven by user created content to aid the campus without the need for an immense support staff.
Benchmarking
As mentioned previously, Indiana University has set the bar in terms of benchmarking a university knowledge base. It is elegant in its simplicity and design yet reveals a depth of information that is somewhat staggering for a campus support site. It could be argued that it has so much relevant information, that even non-students would find it incredibly helpful for any technology support issue. Obviously an overwhelming amount of work went into its construction and the payoff is visible. This would be the first point of entry for a student looking for help. Assuming even only one out of five students found the help they were looking for, that results in thousands of calls/requests not placed to Indiana’s support line and help desk which results in resources allowed to do other things. Just from scrolling through the glossary in their knowledge base, I can see entries for topics that would most likely never be raised by a student; though the inclusion of such topics achieves a ‘future-proofing’ of the information. When analyzing their knowledge base with Jack Seuss’ vision in mind, however, one has to wonder just how much of an aid user created content would be to such a site. While their depth of data is vast, it is not all encompassing, and any addition or change to their knowledge base must be made by Indiana’s support staff. This wealth of information just means exponentially more additions and changes to be made. Student driven entries would allow for a constant flux of content that would make this powerful site even more useful. In more of alignment with UMBC’s present site design are many other university supports infrastructures. For example, University at Albany has a similar layout to our OIT site, with the main difference being organization via drop-down menus as opposed to pull-out menus. However, there are other peer sites, such as University of Rhode Island, who have successfully employed the wiki strategy in their help desk section of their student support site. It appears to be in its infancy at the moment, but shows that other institutions have also seen this as a successful strategy.
User Analysis
User interviews are vital to the site scope in that they tell interested parties, primarily sponsors and the architects of the site, whether their long term goals are worth pursuing. I interviewed four people who had somewhat similar views but disagreed on a few issues. The summary of these interviews can be said as such: Informative FAQs are typically not available, remote aid is crucial in the future of technical support, and communication plays a vital role in any troubleshooting. The topic of FAQs seems to be an interesting one. People often seemed to look for them first, but in regards to my interviews, they often could not be found. A great many problems could be first stemmed with an informative FAQ acting as a first line of defense. Another glaringly obvious topic touched upon in various interviews is that of communication between users and staff. Responses varied from using a phone or email as a means of initially asking for help but I think it can be agreed that either way requires a degree of understanding between parties. Finally, and possibly most importantly, many interviewees were asked if they would prefer remote software so tech support staff was able to control their machines and diagnose and fix problems from off-site. The answers were resoundingly yes. My own interviewees commented that they do in fact use this method currently and it works well. It allows them to resume work while support does their job. More importantly it allows staff to aid users without being on-site, which essentially means they can help more people in a smaller window of time due to the absence of travel. Security issues are a concern, but most are easily fixable with some effort.
Strategy
The sponsor’s needs are very specific which leads to very specific strategies that can be employed. The inclusion of the user interviews also allows for the introduction of a few key points within this overlying strategy.
This strategy would meet the long-term goals of the sponsors and the users. Support would be more effective and faster and more seamless for the end user. More importantly, it would allow the core support staff to help more people in less time without adding to its ranks.