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In the last five years there has been much talk about IT, or business function, service desk consolidation. However, as with most things we talk about in IT, one size doesn't fit all. For many organizations, a single (IT) service desk in a single geography using a single language will not work — even with 24x7 operations.
Of course a single (IT) service desk might use multiple languages. Or multiple (IT) service desks might use a single language.
The challenges of multi-language operations
For many global companies there is a corporate language for business operations. And thus the challenge is more HR-related in terms of recruiting or training employees in that corporate language. But can a global company seriously expect everyone across the spectrum of roles that uses IT to be fluent in a single language?
And the language issue is not only relevant from a verbal-interaction perspective. The capture of data in the chosen ITSM tool is also an issue — whether it's by a service desk agent or via self-service — as is the passing of that data between potentially geographically dispersed resolution groups (level 1, 2, and 3 plus escalations).
It can be a complicated choice between using the corporate language across the board or at least starting with the native language at the initial point of contact.
The challenges of multi-geography
From a geography perspective, the dispersal of service desk activity raises challenges across a number of areas:
- Managing people and performance across multiple teams
- Technology issues such as consolidating onto a single ITSM tool, connectivity (where the chosen ITSM tool(s) works well in some geographies but not others), and data management strategy
- Processes adoption can be far more complicated than just trying to use a common, single set of processes across geographies
- Cultural issues, which extends beyond the interaction between people to both process and technology utilization.
Common language (and people) practices
If there is a single corporate language then this section is probably irrelevant. But for companies that are working in the local language, for the service desk the local language is usually used at Level 1 for both verbal interactions and the capture of incident or service request information.
However, beyond Level 1 the local language data is commonly translated into, and then actioned in, English (for both escalations and Level 2 and Level 3 support). This is a common practice and supported by most tool vendors with products designed to deal with the complexities of geographically-dispersed service desks.
The important learning here is that trying to use multiple languages beyond the Level 1 interactions just doesn't work when, for instance, the end user and service desk agent are using French, the incident is escalated to a senior manager in the UK, Level 2 support is provided from India, and Level 3 support from suppliers in the US. Thus English as a second language is often critical for most IT employees involved in global incident and problem management processes. Hence the geographic location of service desks might therefore become important in order to recruit staff that are bi-lingual. Outside of Level 1 support the record is then updated and maintained in English too.
Language issues and challenges also apply to known errors and knowledge articles.
Self-service and local politics add complexity
Where the spoken language for calls is the local language, one piece of the jigsaw that is easily overlooked is that the end user might want/need to receive updates on his or her call. While the service desk analyst might be able to translate a record updated in English on the fly, if self-service facilities are provided the record will also need to be translated back into the local language. Again the technology should support this. These language issues not only apply to incidents and service requests, they are also applicable for problems and change requests.
Local politics might also come into play. If senior IT or line of business people are based in an English-speaking country say, then there might be a bias towards English at Level 1 — whether this is a top-down push or a bottom-up willingness to pander to superiors. In such cases Level 1 employees still might document their non-English calls in English which can bring its own issues with future end-user interactions.
Part two of this blog will look at the technology requisites.
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