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Title: The Complete Help Desk Guide by Mary Lenz ISBN: 0-936648-96-1 Publisher: CMP Books Pub. Date: 01 November, 1996 Format: Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $24.95 |
Average Customer Rating: 2.75 (4 reviews)
Rating: 2
Summary: Better choices available
Comment: PROS:
1. Good source for someone looking to buy a call tracking system.
2. Good coverage of telecommuting and internet support.
3. Nice case-studies and quotes.
CONS:
1. Infomercial is my first impression. Hyped is my second.
2. The "mother of all guides" lists only 43 sources.
3. Many critical Help Desk topics are not covered at all.
Mary Lenz is well known to many of us because of her writing and editing for Call Center magazine. I'm sad to report that much of the style of that publication made its way into this book, leaving me with the feeling I was reading an infomercial pretty much from start to finish. There is certainly some good information between the covers, but it's a bit oversold.
Two inconsistencies struck me in this book. First, exaggeration: "Mary is the world's leading expert on Help Desks." Really?! I haven't even heard Bill Rose, Ron Muns or Mikael Blaisdell make such a brazen claim. I would change the title to "Selecting a Call Tracking System" since the book clearly is much less complete than any of several recent help desk books. Even the main element of the book, it's listing of vendors, "the mother of all guides," only contains 43 companies. Microsoft's sourcebook lists over 100 solutions. This left my cynical little mind wondering if the listings had anything to do with advertising dollars. Second, the book has far too many editing errors in it. What an embarrassment given that Lenz is an editor by profession. In short, this all left me with the dissatisfied feeling that Lenz had more to offer. On to the good stuff!
The book offers some of the best material available (inexpensively) on selecting a call tracking system for your support center. This kind of information (RFP's, solution briefs, advice on buying a system) is commonly request on the HDESK-L listserv. While there are many on-line sources for this kind of information, Lenz's book is a nice contribution in this area. It also ensures rapid obsolescence as the market changes.
Lenz's book has a strong section on telecommuting for support staff--an area ignored or weakly covered in other support books. There are also a few paragraphs on internet-based support (definitely a hot topic these days). Finally, there are many nice quotations from industry leaders and (mostly) vendors. While this is a strength of the book, it exacerbates the (possibly incorrect) perception that Lenz is an editor, not an authority in her own right.
Rating: 2
Summary: Too Little Substance too many vendor lists
Comment: Looking for a "complete" guide to helpdesks, I was disappointed to read this book and find not a lot of substance. I picked up this book at a call center trade show for a low price. It was not even worth the [dollar amount] that I paid for it.
If you subscribe to Call Center Magazine or some other Call center publication, you will be able to research the various vendors yourself.
Don't spend your money on this book
Rating: 3
Summary: Hardly Complete
Comment: The title is a bit deceptive - this book serves best as a primer for those who have little or no prior knowledge of help desks. Those familiar with the topic will quickly move through the book and discover that the better half is devoted to synopsii of help desk applications. And while that information is useful, much of it is readily available on the Internet.
For those researching help desks for the sake of a technical writing project or for managers looking for information to improve an existing help desk, this book will likely fall short of the mark.
The writer's style is encouraging and you do sense that she knows much more than the book contains. And the pages that deal with workplace ergonomics were nice, although they didn't seem alltogether pertitent to the main theme.
Not a bad book, but hardly "complete."
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Title: Running an Effective Help Desk, 2nd Edition by Barbara Czegel ISBN: 0471248169 Publisher: John Wiley & Sons Pub. Date: 13 March, 1998 List Price(USD): $50.00 |
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Title: Help Desk Practitioner's Handbook by Barbara Czegel ISBN: 0471319929 Publisher: John Wiley & Sons Pub. Date: 16 December, 1998 List Price(USD): $44.99 |
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Title: Building & Managing a World Class IT Help Desk by Bob Wooten, G. Robert Wooten ISBN: 007213237X Publisher: McGraw-Hill Osborne Media Pub. Date: 26 April, 2001 List Price(USD): $39.99 |
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Title: How to Manage the IT Helpdesk - A Guide for User Support and Call Center Managers by Noel Bruton ISBN: 0750649011 Publisher: Butterworth-Heinemann Pub. Date: 15 June, 2002 List Price(USD): $47.95 |
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Title: IT Problem Management by Gary Walker, Gary S. Walker ISBN: 013030770X Publisher: Prentice Hall PTR Pub. Date: March, 2001 List Price(USD): $39.99 |
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