Anatomy of a Trouble(d) Ticket:

Martha LundgrenTexas Association of School Boards

Copyright 2007, Texas Association of School Boards

Thanks to Tarina Williams and the ITT group at Austin Energy for sharing templates and internal training materials.

Benefits of ticket documentationbest practices

Minimize customerfrustration

Reduce duplicationof work

Benefits of ticket documentationbest practices (cont.)

Promote collaboration

Increase credibilityof support staff

Benefits of ticket documentationbest practices (cont.)

Speed knowledgetransfer

Promote problemmanagement and problem prevention

“The truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the

truth”

Three C’s – Complete, Concise, Correct

• Complete– Every incident/request

gets logged!– Who? What? When?

Where? How?– Priority, severity, impact,

urgency– Others?

etc.etc.

etc.

etc.

etc. etc.

etc.

etc.

Three C’s . . .

• Concise– BLUF– Just the facts, ma’am– Lists vs narrative– Ask one, answer one

Three C’s . . .

• Correct– Client information

Mary Jones

512-123-4567Acme Brik

maryj@acmebrik.com

Three C’s . . .

• Correct– Client information– Short subject description

Three C’s . . .

• Correct– Client information– Short subject description– Specific steps to perform

a function or fix

One more . . .

Commitment

Writing ticket descriptions, resolutions and notes

• Know your audience– Who are you

writing for?– What do they want

from you?– Writing style

appropriate to audience

Incident manager

Level II techs

Problem manager

Peer techs

Yourmanager

The customer

Knowledge manager

Yourself

. . . or all of the above?

Who are you writing for?

Keep it professional

• Address the service request, not the person or personality

• <snip> quotes from e-mail

• Use only common, widely used abbreviations

• Avoid jargon

• First or third person; names or pronouns?

• Grammar and spelling matter

Organizational Standards

• Specific

• Objective

• Actionable

• Relevant

• Professional

Documentationimprovement program

1. Review current state2. Develop

a. organizational standardsb. standardized ticket scorecard c. training and coaching program

3. Pilot4. Review results of the pilot5. Communicate WIIFM6. Train – Coach – Review – Repeat7. Incorporate in new hire training

Service Ticket Quality Assessment

What’s wrong (and right!) with these tickets?

60936 Incident #

Opened on 10/04/2006 by John Stockton

Assigned to John Stockton

Closed on 10/04/2006 by John Stockton

Phone Extension Building Room

Dora Explorer Rooster ISD

Organization Client Name

can not get board book to open. All I get is a beep when I click on board book but I can go to any other place on mytasb.

Resolution Incident Description

User had popup blockers turned on. I keep telling him not to.

Subject BB Problems

Contact Type Boardbook Priority 3

60951 Incident #

Opened on 10/05/2006 by John Stockton

Assigned to Phillip Langoria

Closed on 10/05/2006 by John Stockton

73217

Phone Extension

S 32139

Building Room

Jeremy Bornstein TASB

Organization Client Name

My hipath keeps locking up and I can not log in

Resolution Incident Description

Ref to Phil

Subject Telephone issues

Contact Type Telephone Priority 3

60959 Incident #

Opened on 10/09/2006 by Shirley Jones

Assigned to Michael Jordan

Closed on 10/09/2006 by Michael Jordan

72240

Phone Extension

N 31058

Building Room

Mary Brouillet TASB

Organization Client Name

Part 1: Cannot open any Outlook mailbox; all profiles prompt for a password and no password is accepted. Changed network password this morning. Part 2: Can now log into her own mailbox but is prompted for a password and should not be. Cannot log into fax mailbox.

Resolution Incident Description

Part 1: Fax mailbox had been locked. Andy reset the password. Part 2: Andy suggested restarting PC and trying again. Walked user through logging in to both accounts. Just needed the correct password for DPC Fax and had user put in new network password for prompt and save password.

Subject Outlook Profile Problems

Contact Type TASB Priority 2

References

• Neider, Julie - Basic Writing Skills for The Support Professional (HDI Focus Book)

• Muns, Ron –The Call Ticket “Long Description” (Muns Report, Vol. 5 No. 11)