Document Your Support Procedures
By Julie L. Mohr

To be efficient, service and support organizations must develop procedures to document the tasks associated with the high-level process flow for their existing processes. To create a procedure, you should begin by identifying the tasks required to accomplish support procedures, then identify who performs the tasks, and the inputs and outputs to each procedure.

Technology plays an important role in the overall support process by automating procedural steps whenever possible. Technologies that enable the procedure should also be identified. The best place to start is to have your support processes clearly defined and mapped out. Within the process flow, each flow symbol should have a related procedure when a series of tasks must be performed.

Key Attributes
The Support Center Procedure Template should identify all key “meta-data” associated with support processes. This meta-data defines the context of the procedure within the support processes. Each procedure must have the same set of meta-data to ensure consistency throughout procedure documents. Key attributes include: the procedure name, the owner, the unique procedure number, its current revision, the department that owns the procedure, the support teams that it impacts, and the tools used within the procedure. Depending on the formality of your support environment and the audience of your procedure documents, you may need additional information or find some of the meta-data to be too much information. However, keep in mind that it is important to establish the procedure owner and the data of last revision.

A suggested list of common service and support procedures includes:

The list is not meant to be all inclusive. It’s meant to provide a basic structure of what should be documented in your environment.

Procedures should be kept in a central repository where you write once and everyone has a recent copy with no potential duplicates that are out of date. The most natural repository for procedures is the corporate intranet, file share, or email public folders. Restrict the ability to print the procedures. As soon as they have been printed, errors have a greater possibility of occurring.

A document manager is a key role within the support organization. This ensures that the data is being monitored, updated, and maintained. Add the responsibility of procedure document manager to your career path within your organization or rotate the responsibility every six months through the senior members of your team.

Tech-Writing Style Tips

Tip 1: Break your procedures down into task-oriented, procedural steps and actions:
1. Task
a. Step
b. Step
i. Action
ii. Action
2. Task

Number the tasks, steps, and actions when they must be performed in a particular order. If no particular order is necessary, use simple bullets.

Tip 2: Break each task into the series of steps required to accomplish the task. When defining steps within your procedure, make sure each step meets the following requirements:
• Identify all actions under each step
• Provide a result to an action when necessary
• Use graphics, when appropriate, to communicate more clearly

Tip 3: If graphics or screen shots are necessary, refer to diagrams by labeling the diagram and using the reference within the procedure text.
Tip 4: Separate instructions from expository information. Examples of instructions include warnings, cautions, or notes used to communicate additional information not closely connected with the flow of the procedure. For example:

Note: The following step must be performed on older versions of the VPN client.
Caution: Approval must be obtained from department head prior to ordering computer.
Warning: This can only be completed by an A+ certified technician or it will void the warranty.

Tip 5: Use tables as a look-up or reference for a particular value within a procedure. A table can communicate information more succinctly than asking a series of if-then questions.

Tip 6: Results are often not necessary for technical users as they are implied within the action. A step will imply a logical result to the analyst. But when defining procedures for users, be sure to clearly separate results from actions. You cannot assume that an end user knows what to expect as a result of a particular action. For example:

End User Procedure: Resetting Your Password Using the Web Interface
Open Internet Explorer by clicking on its icon in the system tray.
Result: A web page will be opened in Internet Explorer.

Tip 7: Use bold to represent a choice or element within the graphical user interface. In most circumstances, these elements are also capitalized. For example:

Step 1. From the File menu, select Open.

Tip 8: Use the pronoun “you,” “user,” or the implied “you.” Eliminate any references to “we” or “us” as the company or team documenting the procedure.

Tip 9: Use strong active language to depict a step or action. For example:

Wrong: Fill-in the blanks in the form.
Correct: Complete the form.

Tip 10: Use gender-neutral language.

Wrong: Add a shortcut to his or her desktop.
Correct: Add a shortcut to the user’s desktop.

Tip 11: Use parallel structure within the bullets or numbered steps and actions. If you begin one step with a verb, all steps in the sequence should also begin with a verb.

1. Remove the cover from the computer.
2. Insert the card into the first available slot.
3. Replace the cover.

Tip 12: Don’t duplicate information. Create sub-procedures that can be cross-referenced using hyperlinks within your document repository. This will enable more efficient maintenance of your procedure documentation. Otherwise a change in a sub-process will require revision in multiple procedural documents. Controlled redundancy is a characteristic of good database management systems.

Procedure documentation is an important component of a successful support organization. Procedures create consistency of process adherence and customer support experience. Do not document procedures to address a particular service issue. Document your procedures to develop a set of realistic and simple guidelines on how to provide efficient and consistent service to your customers. Without them, you are destined to struggle with customer satisfaction as your organization grows and becomes more complex.

About the Author
Julie Mohr is a Managing Consultant for Alternative Resources Corporation. She has 14 years of experience in the IT industry with eight years of progressive management responsibility in information technology services. Ms. Mohr has a degree in Computer Science from the Ohio State University and is a Certified Helpdesk Director from Helpdesk 2000.
Ms. Mohr maintains industry expertise and presence through conference speaking engagements and publishing articles on best practices. Ms. Mohr is the published author of “The Help Desk Audit: Blueprint for Success” and maintains a service desk enhancement Web site at www.blueprintaudits.com.