It’s Different IT: Tech Support for Remote Users

By 2023, nearly one-third of full-time workers in the finance and professional and technical services sectors were working remotely, according to Statista. That doesn’t account for the many companies that routinely allow employees to work from home or remote offices on a periodic basis. Remote work has changed the face of IT technical support, which now must support a cast of users it rarely or never sees.  

In the applications area, what used to be a question about an internal system now could be related to an outside cloud-hosted app. In the networking area, what used to be a straightforward setup and configuration of a workstation, printer or mobile device in a user department, now becomes the management and execution of configurations, security, devices and functional issues at distant locations.  

“We addressed a lot of this remote computing by automating our software and security updates so that new versions of software would automatically be downloaded and installed for remote users without us having to be there,” said one telecommunications industry IT manager I recently spoke with. “But the real pipe dream is being able to do all IT support remotely because it’s time-consuming and difficult to get personnel out to remote locations.”   

Related:Onboarding Employees in the Age of Remote

Can you totally avoid physical trips out to sites? Today’s answer is no, no matter how good your automation is.  

There are new systems, networks and devices that will require hands-on physical installations and checkouts onsite. Periodic maintenance visits are needed to ensure that servers hidden away in remote office closets aren’t laden with dust, operating in high temperatures or high humidity conditions, going without regular backups, or being left unsecured during non-office hours.  

Despite this challenge, there are various steps you can take to improve, and in some cases, transform the way that IT does remote support.  

Here are six of them:  

1. Train users in security practices and use multi-factor authentication and zero-trust networks.  

Last year, six of the 10 most common security breaches that were cited by Splunk required end-user engagement for them to happen.  Phishing, malware injections, social engineering, and the creation and sharing of weak passwords were among them.  

One practice is to train all new employees and to annually refresher-train existing employees on the best security practices. Besides user IDs and passwords, many companies also now send codes, use biometrics, etc., which forces users to provide an additional identification parameter such as multifactor identification to the system before they can gain access.  

Related:Quick Study: Managing and Supporting Remote Work

More companies are also moving to zero-trust networks that can track any new additions or changes to the network and flag them, so IT can assure that the changes and additions have been authorized.  

Security is one of the primary touchstones and risk points for remote support. By proactively training users and using robust IT tools to lock down security, risk threats at remote sites can be diminished.  

2. Expand the help desk so it includes network issues.  

Too often, IT help desk support focuses on applications trouble tickets, but network connectivity and performance are not included.   

Remote users and sites require network connectivity and performance. Likely, this means adding personnel to the help desk who have network and communications backgrounds so that network issues can be expeditiously addressed.   

3. Develop effective self-help resources. 

 Employees are big fans of online self-help that enables them to resolve their own issues independently, provided the self-help works!  

Too often, self-help scripts are written by engineers and programmers who lack the skills needed for explaining and resolving an issue.  

Related:6 Ways to Manage Cybersecurity Burnout and Support Teams Better

One recommendation is to use individuals with strong communications skills, and preferably with teaching backgrounds in developing the scripts. These are the individuals most likely to understand what users need, and to develop understandable and actionable problem resolution guidance.  

4. Use remote access to assist with problem resolution.  

There will be times when problems are so complex that it’s impossible for a user or the help desk to solve them.  In these cases, IT support personnel can remotely access a user’s device through screen sharing technologies (e.g. TeamViewer, Windows Quick Assist, etc.). Both the user and IT can see what’s going on, and IT can coach the user through what the user needs to do to resolve a local issue.  

5. Train user para-IT assistants and/or outsource support for remote locations.  

For companies operating in multiple countries in particular, it’s important to have a local IT support presence.   

An approach that has worked well for multi-national companies is to outsource support to a local vendor in the country who can also speak the native language. Another option is to train IT paraprofessionals who perform another function (e.g., manufacturing manager), but who can double as an IT support person when needed.   

6. Do make physical visits.  

Even if your remote technical support strategy is working flawlessly, it’s important to make periodic visits to remote sites. A zero-trust network isn’t going to detect a standalone PC that was brought in by a manager to work on a separate set of spreadsheets, nor will it know if a physical server kept in closeted area is full of dust and hasn’t had a data backup for three weeks straight.  

When physical support visits are scheduled, it’s important to let users know in advance. In this way, users can alert IT tech support to issues of physical performance that software downloads, person-to-person chats, phone calls and device sharing can’t solve.