Providing Just-In-Time Training and Performance Support with Blackberry® Pushcasts

Organizations invest in BlackBerry® smartphones to increase employee productivity and deliver business value. However, business leaders understand that each new IT implementation - like the rollout of BlackBerry® smartphones to employees - increases support volume and overhead for help desks. As a result, help desk managers need solutions to effectively manage additional volume with existing resources.

Reducing Costs and Increasing ROI
Unfortunately, IT leaders face a number of pressures in trying to achieve their cost- and productivity- related goals. Help desk managers are expected to deal with the additional support load that comes with distributing BlackBerry® smartphones to employees, but, in an effort to save money, the help desk often may not receive additional manpower to handle the increased support issues. Further, companies expect IT leaders to assume responsibility for technology absorption – that is, IT managers must help companies leverage their BlackBerry® investment. Another challenge is that employees need to learn – sometimes on the fly – how best to use their BlackBerry® device for increased output without placing inordinate demands on help desk staff. To reduce help-desk volumes, IT leaders are pressured to deliver easy-to-access, easy-to-understand technical training for employees in the field. Finally, IT leaders need to maintain employee satisfaction with technical support. When problems occur, employees are frustrated, and frustration grows if an issue is not resolved quickly. In the worst cases, this can lead to animosity among departments and ultimately reduces cooperative effort and trust between entire teams of staff.

To sum up, IT managers responsible for help desk operations must:
  • Contain or reduce help desk costs.
  • Leverage the BlackBerry® investment.
  • Provide straightforward and painless product training.
  • Maintain employee satisfaction with support services.
Mobile chalkboard™: Helping the Help Desk
In an ideal world, new IT investments would support themselves; Mobile chalkboard™ on Blackberry smartphones is almost able to do just that. Because Mobile chalkboard™ is a mobile application on the BlackBerry, it actually can be used to reduce the number of BlackBerry-related help desk calls and to lower help desk costs. With easy access to anywhere, anytime content, organizations can also reduce the need for increased staffing at their help desks, and lower call volume.

Mobile chalkboard™ offers numerous benefits to help desk teams:
  1. Provides just-in-time help to BlackBerry® users.
    If employees run into a technical problem, they can access self-help content for common issues on BlackBerry® devices, so they can get answers without having to call the help desk. This reduces time and minimizes frustration while employees get issues resolved. What’s more, help content is available offline, so employees can access assistance with or without an Internet connection.

  2. Improves productivity by teaching employees how to make the most of BlackBerry® functionality:
    To help employees get familiar with their mobile devices, how-to modules for functions that deliver the greatest productivity and value are included on the BlackBerry® device.

  3. Establishes a platform to deploy other business applications
    to the BlackBerry®:
    Mobile chalkboard™ with how-to and help content acts as an application platform that can be used by multiple business units to distribute other business applications, which in turn, increases the value of the BlackBerry® device. (For example, sales or implementation tools).

  4. Captures employee agreement to BlackBerry® usage policies:
    IT managers need to ensure employees agree to specified terms for using company devices. Mobile chalkboard™ allows IT to have employees agree to BlackBerry® and other usage policies right on the device.

  5. Collects feedback on BlackBerry® usage or other IT topics:
    Mobile chalkboard™ can deliver mobile surveys and questionnaires to employees and collect responses. By surveying employees on BlackBerry® usage or broader topics related to support satisfaction, mobile computing, etc., IT leaders can gain a better understanding of employees’ experiences and needs.
Mobile chalkboard™ Features for Just-In-Time Training and Performance Support
The following Mobile chalkboard features will be important and relevant to IT leaders or help desk managers:
  • Supplies a library of BlackBerry how-to’s and just-in-time help topics: There are currently 32 titles of content in the following four categories:

    • Tips and Tricks

    • Personalizing Your Device

    • Power User

    • Get the Most out of Your BlackBerry Smartphone

  • Puts BlackBerry® help and how-to’s on the device for just-in-time access:Mobile chalkboard formats content appropriately and delivers it right to BlackBerry® devices, so how-to’s and help are easily accessible.
  • Delivers BlackBerry® how-to content that is interactive with rich media:Mobile chalkboard’s delivery method does not tax the IT infrastructure, which alleviates help desk concerns about excessive bandwidth requirements.
  • Requires limited bandwidth to deliver rich content, including video: Mobile chalkboard’s delivery method does not tax the IT infrastructure, which alleviates help desk concerns about excessive bandwidth requirements.
  • Secure delivery of content: Mobile chalkboard allows IT to set security at a level to meet their specific needs (e.g. prevent content from being forwarded or transferred to a PC, etc) and safeguard sensitive company information.
  • Allows content to be taken “offline”: The option for employees to access how-to and help content while “offline” provides more flexibility to take advantage of downtime or to access the content when they are unable to access the carrier network.
  • Tracks usage of content and reports on results: Tracking of all content gives IT an understanding of what material employees access. Tracking features also allow IT to identify potential problem areas or report usage data to support the business case for the application.

For more information on providing just-in-time training & performance support with BlackBerry Pushcasts, please contact us at bvanhatten@chalk.com.
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