The following is a guest article by Dan O’Connor, VP Partner Success at HCTec
Quality healthcare depends on mission-critical applications and devices being accessible and functional around the clock. That reality puts enormous pressure on the IT service desk, which is expected to resolve issues quickly and keep clinical work moving without interruption.
Recent advances in artificial intelligence (AI) have brought real innovation to service desk workflows. It is now possible to automate password resets and system access requests, and to automatically deliver troubleshooting guides and supporting documentation to end users who need help. As a result, the service desk can respond to high-volume, repetitive requests almost instantly.
Automation clearly benefits the IT service desk, but health systems should remember that speed alone does not improve the end-user experience. Fortunately, AI is poised to make a difference here as well—and there are valuable lessons to draw from how other industries have transformed the customer experience.
By analyzing IT service desk interactions, organizations gain far greater visibility into how users engage with support. Those insights can be applied not only to resolve issues but also to improve service desk efficiency and, ultimately, to enable proactive support.
AI is behind experience-driven outcomes
Organizations do not always think of the IT service desk in terms of customer interactions, but adopting that lens helps leaders understand why, where, and how to elevate the user experience.
It is no secret that consumers prefer simple, convenient, and personalized engagements with the brands they rely on. Forrester describes this as creating outcomes-based digital experiences—an approach that emphasizes a consumer’s needs and goals and focuses on the holistic customer journey rather than isolated transactions.
That stands in stark contrast to making customers complete a series of individual tasks every time they interact with a brand: enter their information, wait for a reply, provide more information, and so on. It sounds a lot like the typical IT service desk experience, doesn’t it? And while that friction is merely frustrating in low-acuity situations, it becomes unacceptable when medical records can’t be retrieved, monitoring devices suddenly go offline, or clinicians on rounds get locked out.
There is a better way. Optimizing how AI is used in the IT service desk provides agents and end users with tools to improve the experience on both sides of the desk. Examples include:
- Call-routing systems that analyze a user’s history to predict their concern and route the request to the agent best equipped to handle it
- Sentiment analysis that surfaces common themes and user behaviors across requests, which can be applied to calls in real time or used to pinpoint recurring causes of disruption
- Chatbots that guide users through simple troubleshooting tasks, allowing them to resolve problems on their own or escalate to a human agent as needed
The next evolution: AI-based quality scoring
AI has already brought clear improvements to IT service desk operations. Simple questions and routine requests are resolved quickly, freeing clinical users to focus on patient care. Agents, in turn, can spend more time applying their skills to complex, critical requests.
But AI’s value to the service desk does not stop there. Once again, health systems can look to how AI is used to assess the quality of customer interactions and apply those lessons to the service desk.
Companies that run customer contact centers increasingly use AI to evaluate every customer interaction—not just the small sample that can be reviewed manually. That makes the review process both thorough and objective, because assessments can no longer be cherry-picked.
With full visibility into customer interactions, companies can detect patterns in agent performance, identify which issues are hardest to resolve, and even assign a quality score to each interaction. Armed with that concrete data, organizations have a clear path for identifying where to improve.
The same strategies apply to the IT service desk. Analyzing the full range of interactions end users have with support—phone calls, chatbot conversations, help desk tickets, emails, and text messages—offers unparalleled insight into the bottlenecks and delays that cause frustration and, ultimately, affect patient care.
Quality that drives proactive support
AI-driven quality scoring delivers several benefits. Leaders can see which types of issues routinely require after-call work and develop strategies to reduce that burden on agents. They can also readily identify high and low-performing agents and implement targeted training plans to address areas of concern.
Quality assessment can also pave the way for proactive service desk support:
- If many employees in the same department request access to the same software application, an automatic installation could save considerable time.
- Repeated reports of connectivity or performance issues could prompt a timely conversation about system upgrades.
- Requests that take little time or effort for agents to resolve could be candidates for automation. Conversely, chatbot conversations or automated workflows that routinely require an agent to step in could be re-elevated to a ticket.
Many health systems have already used automation in the IT service desk to increase speed, maximize efficiency, and improve the end-user experience. Now, organizations have an opportunity to go a step further—leveraging AI to assess user engagements the way companies review customer interactions. The insights that follow can drive meaningful process improvements and create a better experience for everyone, so users can stay focused on healthcare’s critical mission.
Dan O’Connor is Vice President of Client Experience at HCTec, where he partners with healthcare organizations to improve IT service delivery, operational performance, and end-user experience. With more than 25 years of healthcare and healthcare technology leadership experience, Dan combines a clinical background as a registered nurse with executive leadership experience that includes serving as a Chief Information Officer. His unique perspective across clinical operations, IT strategy, and managed services enables him to align technology initiatives with organizational goals while driving measurable improvements in service quality, efficiency, and user satisfaction.
Throughout his career, Dan has led large-scale healthcare IT transformations, managed services operations, service desk organizations, and clinical technology initiatives supporting Epic, Oracle Health (Cerner), and MEDITECH environments. He is passionate about helping health systems leverage technology, optimize workflows, and deliver exceptional support experiences that ultimately enhance patient care.
HCTec is a proud sponsor of Healthcare Scene
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