The Life and Death of an American Help Desk Agent

by Geospart

This story is about me and people like me.

I work on a help desk and have been doing so for many years.  I am a technical war veteran so to speak and there are many like me.  I have seen three desks that I have worked on go to India and I have seen good friends get laid off.  I am tapping out some of my observations and criticisms of the help desk industry and how great people get kicked around in it.

Literally most people that work on help desks for some time find that they have become what I would call a technical guru.

Especially if you reach that next pinnacle of Tier Two.  Basically, help desks have different levels.

Tier Zero is a non-technical initial call-taking person.  They will take the information and have a Tier One work on the issue and contact the customer back.  Tier Zeros are only used as overflow in case there is an issue with the phone system or if all Tier Ones are busy.

Tier Ones are more technical but they must keep their calls within a certain time range, meaning if the calls start heading for ten minutes, then they have been on the call too long.

Tier Twos work just underneath the development staff and are able to work outside normal realms of technical support.  What I mean is that they are people who have proven that they can think outside the box.  They test issues and find possible solutions, and to some extent even write code.

If the problem is determined to be a code issue after massive testing then the issue is sent to Tier Three (the developer) for a possible code patch or additional fixes for new code release of the product.

I personally have worked a mainframe Tier Two desk for the past six years.  I moved from New York to Charlotte, North Carolina in 2001 and I started working for IBM as a contractor.

I was hired by a company called Sykes via a phone interview.  I had worked on two other help desks previously and I had supported many different products.  I was hired for my massive experience and I started on a Tier One desk here in Charlotte.

Within three months I was approached and asked if I would consider Tier Two because management had noticed that I had the skills of what they called a troubleshooter.  Basically I could think outside of simply looking in documents to fix issues, plus I had a pretty good phone personality and the clients liked me.

I could calm the harshest customer down with a few clean jokes and by projecting the confidence that they would conclude my call with them minus the issue that they had called about.

When I became a Tier Two and was being trained by other Tier Twos, one of the trainers remarked to me that the reason they liked me is that I never asked the same question twice.  Basically I retained knowledge and never needed help on the same issue twice.  After my first month I was known as a bug finder, meaning I would find bugs in code and submit it to the development group.

Now let's shoot up to today.

After working on this desk for years now, all the people that trained me have moved on to other jobs and most of the people under me I trained.  IBM was forced to hire me because some sort of contract dispute with Sykes forced my company out.  IBM was cheap though.

Instead of hiring me at full cost and as a full employee they hired me as a supplemental.  What this means is they can pay me less than others and yet still exploit my talents.  IBM Charlotte has this trick they pull.  Say that a major company like a newspaper or restaurant contracts IBM for their help desk.  Normally that contract would say that IBM will provide, as an example, 12 dedicated help desk agents to them.

But in reality, those 12 would also be supporting other desks eventually (they kind of slip them in), doubling and tripling their call volume.  This saves on hiring 24 more people for two other desks and IBM keeps the profits.

So let's put this into perspective.  IBM is contracted to provide for three companies, 12 people each, for a total of 36 people.  In reality they provide only 12 people and save tons of money, and I am sure increase the bonuses of people above all of us.  They also keep a few extra contractors around to answer some overflow, and of course if a customer visits they can dedicate 12 people to the customer cause while they are on site.

They mainly do this with Tier One desks but recently they have been doing this with Tier Twos.

Tier Twos now seem to have to answer Tier One and Tier Zero calls from time to time.  Anything for one of the world's richest companies to squeeze more money out of its employees.

Sorry, I know I should not take corporate policy personally, but now I am the guy doubling calls and I am the guy getting laid off to increase someone's bonus.

In a little under two weeks I will be hitting the unemployment lines.  I will if needed provide follow-ups and updates along with further detailed information about the depleting army of help desk agents in the United States.