The core task of Incident Management is to respond quickly and reliably to service requests throughout the entire organization. As Switzerland's number 1 for communications, IT and entertainment, Swisscom is shaping the future. Swisscom is one of the most innovative and sustainable companies in Switzerland. A total of over 19,000 employees work for Swisscom.
We were able to support the development and digitalization of the incident management processes in order to seamlessly integrate existing data sources and map the complete incident management lifecycle from service request to analytical optimization.
Initial situation in incident management
The starting point for this project was declining customer satisfaction and unusual key figures in key performance indicator (KPI) reporting. The KPI values and reporting analyses indicated weaknesses in the 2nd, but especially in the 3rd levelwhile everything seemed fine in 1st level support.
Incident management measures whether the services are completed within the specified times. As expected, as many customers as possible should be served as quickly as possible with standard solutions at 1st level, while as few very complex tasks as possible should be handled by highly specialized employees at 3rd level
The aim of the time specifications for each service level is to filter the complexity of the cases according to the expert level and with the best possible quality and response time for customers.
Incident Management KPI's incorrectly applied
In this specific case, the employees in 1st level support had delegated requests to 2nd level support as quickly as possible when the service volume was high - but without clarifying the issues in a qualified manner and without solving simple cases themselves - in order to complete their own cases within the specified time.
The 1st level statistics were therefore above average.
At 2nd level, the employees were not only "flooded" with an unexpectedly large number of inquiries, but the poorly prepared individual cases also had to be clarified again with the customer. Due to the unplanned clarification time with customers, cases that could normally be clarified at 2nd level were delegated to 3rd level in order to stay within the time frame.
The 2nd level statistics were therefore worse than expected.
The fact that the 3rd level support was completely unprepared and flooded with everything that was not accomplished in the higher levels did not only lead to a bad mood statistically.
KPIs must be trained
After renewed training on the importance and correct application in 1st level support, 2nd level employees were deployed for a short time in 1st level support as supporters to assist with initial clarification questions and to expand the knowledge libraries for 1st level answers.
This measure alone contained the floods so massively that there was room for further improvements by automating processes.
Further reasons for incident management
Incident management refers to the process of managing and resolving unforeseen events or problems in a company or organization. Here are some of the activities we have supported as part of projects:
- Detection and reporting of incidents: Incident management begins with an event or problem being detected and reported. This can take the form of an automatic warning or manual reporting by an employee.
- Incident classification: Each incident is classified to determine how serious it is and what kind of support is required to resolve the problem.
- Prioritization of incidents: Prioritization is based on the severity of the incident and the potential impact on the company or organization.
- Escalation of incidents: If an incident cannot be resolved within the specified time or by the assigned staff, it is escalated to ensure that it is resolved quickly and effectively.
- Analyzing and resolving incidents: Incident managers and responsible employees analyze the cause of the incident in order to find a suitable solution. The solution is documented and stored in a knowledge database so that similar incidents can be resolved more quickly in the future.
- Communication with users and stakeholders: Users and stakeholders are regularly informed about the status of the incident and the progress of the resolution.
- Monitoring and reporting: Once the resolution is complete, the incident is monitored to ensure it is permanently resolved. Reports are created to identify trends and patterns in the incident to prevent future incidents.
Proud partner and consulting professional
Swisscom is a professional in the integration and service business - but is also convinced of the expertise of its partners. As a partner of Swisscom, we are proud to be able to support not only its customers, but also internal challenges.
