Interviewee: Alicia North

IT Position: Service Delivery Officer within Service Operations Team at TAFE NSW

1. Please tell us about your IT work. What exactly do you do?
As a Service Desk Officer, I am responsible for utilising my experience, knowledge and our documented service desk knowledge articles to deliver a combination of virtual/remote and on-site field support assistance to geographically dispersed staff and key stakeholders. I diagnose and resolve a range of intermittent to complex client requests and incidents at first level, and triage where required. The Service Desk I work in only supports internal TAFE NSW staff. Currently TAFE NSW has a separate Service Desk for student support, however one day in the not too distant future these will be merged and my position will be responsible for supporting both internal staff and external students.

2. Please tell us about the industry you work in?
My position sits within the Technology Management & Support / Service Operations Team within the Systems Group Unit within TAFE NSW. The Systems Group was previously known as the Information Technology Unit (IT), a recent restructure now sees us renamed as the ‘Systems Group’.
TAFE NSW’s purpose is to skill the workforce of the future. It is Australia's leading provider of vocational education and training with over 500,000 annual enrolments and a proud history for setting the benchmark for quality service. As the NSW public provider, it supports the NSW Government's priority to grow skills for the economy and jobs of tomorrow. Critically, TAFE NSW plays a vital role in providing vocational education in rural and regional NSW, and job training pathways for the most vulnerable in the community. TAFE NSW offers the best of campus-based delivery as well as flexible, online and work-based learning. The TAFE NSW values of Customer First, Collaboration, Integrity and Excellence guide our team in strengthening communities, delivering world-class training for our students and producing job ready graduates for employers. The operating environment for TAFE NSW is dynamic as we leverage our scale, expertise, passion and reputation to meet the rapidly changing VET landscape. TAFE NSW is committed to its students and customers and the role it plays in changing lives and opening up opportunities through learning.

3. What other kinds of work do you have to do?

• Deliver a tiered response service for the System Groups field support or service desk on a flexible basis as assigned in order to listen to, diagnose and resolve recurrent client requests.
• Deliver high levels of customer support and services in order to accurately diagnose issues and provide targeted and successful resolutions.
• Respond to common requests for service by providing information to enable fulfilment.
• Promptly allocate unresolved calls/ on site issues in order to deliver customer services that are responsive and timely.
• Update all reports / trackers and initiate follow-up action to ensure a professional level of user support and quality customer service is maintained and escalate complex incidents (as required) to solve problems within agreed service levels and standards.
• Provide knowledgeable technical advice and support to staff using available resources to trouble-shoot system issues and support the efficient use of hardware and software.
• Collaborate with geographically dispersed teams and provide support across TAFE NSW locations and services which may require a flexible and adaptable approach to working hours and working arrangements.
• Maintain records, inform and update users about the processes and advise customer of actions taken to deliver high levels of customer support and service.
• Provide knowledgeable advice on the implementation of security standards and procedures for all hardware and software to protect from unauthorised system access, virus infection, vandalism and unauthorised access to TAFE NSW educational and business software.
• Maintain current knowledge of changing System Groups standards and technology to ensure services are compliant.
• Reflect TAFE NSW’s values in the way you work and abide by policies and procedures to ensure a safe, healthy and inclusive work environment.
• Place the customer at the centre of all decision making.
• Work with the Line Manager to develop and review meaningful performance management and development plans.

4. Who are all the different people you interact with in your work? Tell us about them.

5. Please tell us about your interactions with other IT professionals?
Service Desk & Field Support Lead - Receive leadership, direction and support; Identify and alert when timeframes & SLA’s (Service Level Agreements) may be in jeopardy; Regularly report on issues arising impacting on services delivery.
Service Delivery colleagues - Support team and work collaboratively to contribute to achieving the team’s business outcomes; Provide collegiate support to service desk and field support team members; Participate in meetings to represent work group perspective and share information. Contribute in discussions and decisions regarding implementation of innovation and best practice.
Clients & Customers - Receive a range of requests and incidents for support and resolution; Develop and deliver robust and durable resolutions.

6. What about your interactions with clients or investors?
Vendors/stakeholders - Develop and maintain business-based relationships; Resolve issues and provide durable solutions; Provide information regarding rules and standards

7. What aspects of your work do you spend most time on? Please tell us about these.
Constantly communicating with clients and customers via phone or through logged tickets, making decisions, using my judgement, expertise and knowledge, working on a range of complex and sensitivity tasks/assignments. Commitment to Customer Service, Working Collaboratively and Delivering Results.

8. Which aspects of your work do you find most challenging?
Supporting clients who may not be conversant with IT jargon in order to clearly identify and respond to requests. Understanding of site where client is located/situated when you have never seen or been to the location, you don’t know what equipment they are using and they cant tell you the details you need. They seem to think that we automatically know where they are and what equipment they are using. Responding to the same type of regular, reoccurring, repetitive requests or incident (I find that challenging as sometimes a simple fix can stop the influx of the same repetitive calls or tickets).

9. Can you share an example of the work you do that best captures the essence of the IT industry?
Resolving complex customer issues, continually asking open ended and targeted questions, being empathetic and actively listening and understanding the urgency of a situation. Taking ownership, monitoring/watching, and following-up the ticket right through to resolution. This best describes the essence of the IT Industry, Service Operations Team that I work in.

10. How do you keep your IT Skills relevant and current?
I’m very lucky that we have a lot of in-house training and development resources to access.Other technology resources I utilise are; MS Teams for information, collaboration, and screen sharing; I participate in TAFE professional career development activities including, and Learning Dives; I also participate in external resources such as LinkedIn Learning, Microsoft Academy, Plurasight, Google and YouTube; I’m a member of many forums and groups, where I receive the latest alerts, news, and network with other like-minded colleagues. I have a genuine interest in reading, researching, and keeping up to date with technology and trends using social media.

11. What is your favourite part of the job?
It’s the exposure to people from all different walks of life - that puts a smile on my face. I really enjoy talking and communicating with people. I’ve very rarely have had a difficult customer. I could never work in a job where I had no customer interactions.

12. How do you think further technology advances will impact your IT Job?
With new technology changes and advancement, I see this as a good thing especially in the area that I work in. IT support is something that will always be in demand, people are always going to have questions and problems and want assistance from another person, not a machine.

13. Why do you want to work in IT?
I enjoy the challenge of the changes and evolving environment. I also thoroughly enjoy fixing and resolving problems then educating staff on how they can fix their own problem, should the issue arise again, empowering them along the way with self-help articles etc. Also being in IT everyday there is a new learning experience for me.

14. What are the qualities of working in a successful IT Team environment?
Communication and Team Work! I cannot stress how important having transparency and information freely flowing between the different IT teams in our Systems Group is. Communication is everything, what’s new, what’s changed or going to be changing, what’s broken and offline. There is nothing worse than a customer telling me what isn’t working. I like to always be on the front foot and have the information ready to advise staff as they call.

15. Where do you see your IT career going in the next 5 years?
I want to still be working in the IT Industry. I’m hoping to branch out away from Service Desk work and move into IT teaching, one day.

Interview Recording