IT companies use various KPIs and ITSM (IT service management) metrics to assess their results over time. They will analyze metrics such as response times, resolution times, number of active tickets, and customer satisfaction to have a better understanding of how they performed during a campaign.
“Based on this data, providers can improve various aspects of their ITSM process thus increasing clients’ satisfaction rates,” according to IT Management Solutions, Boston IT services experts. The company also states that underperformance in some of these areas will cause for IT service providers to lose step against competitors, which will eventually lead to company’s downfall.
In this article, we’ll explain why all these metrics matter to providers, but also their clients. After that, we’ll go through some of the most important ITSM metrics for your business.
Benefits of Using ITSM Metrics
There are lots of reasons why informatics companies use KPIs when assessing strategy quality:
- For assessing workflows, performance, and tools used in IT services
- For boosting overall efficiency and identifying potential areas of improvement
- For simplifying and streamlining various procedures
- For increasing the quality of services and predicting results with more accuracy
- For ensuring compliance and eliminate common business risks
By benchmarking these metrics against the company’s goals, you can have a better understanding of how you performed during a campaign. You can use this data to make the necessary tweaks and increase the cohesion of your team. Metrics allow data-driven decisions that will maximize resources, enhance workflows, and ensure strategic planning.
Most Important ITSM Metrics to Track
A service provider can track all sorts of metrics, including:
1. Incident Response Time
Incident response time might be the most important metric in this category. As the name implies, it assesses how much time it takes for an IT team to respond to a disaster.
Fast response times are the best indication of proactive incident management. By quickly responding to the issue, providers can minimize damages and downtime, which leads to higher user satisfaction rates.
2. Incident Resolution Time
It’s not enough to just respond to an incident; team also has to resolve the problem as soon as possible. With this metric, companies can assess employees’ speed as well as their ability to tackle various issues.
When analyzing resolution times, companies aren’t only interested in the big picture. They will track various processes and how much it took for the team to tackle each one of them. That way, they can provide additional training for certain tasks or improve workflow to increase overall efficiency.
3. Request Fulfillment Rate
In the IT world, time is money, which is why fast fulfillment rates are vital for staying in business. With this metric, service providers can assess the speed at which they can complete various client requests, provide information, respond to messages, upgrade software, etc.
Fast fulfillment rates are one of the best indications of operational efficiency. Coupled with response times, this metric shows how quickly you can react to emergencies and reduce damages and downtime.
4. First-Call Resolution Rate
First-call resolution rate shows team’s and employees’ ability to resolve tickets upon first contact. As you can presume, most IT providers are looking to resolve issues as soon as they appear, as this would lead to higher user satisfaction while minimizing damages.
The high rate of first-call resolutions also indicates that the company uses efficient workflows. It is also a good indication of employees’ expertize as well as the fact that the company uses quality tools. Ultimately, having high first-call resolution rates leads to more cost-efficiency and better resource utilization.
5. Active Tickets
The total number of active tickets is a metric that tells us how many tickets are yet to be resolved. First, it shows us the overall workload that the IT team has to tackle during a particular period. The metric also demonstrates the team’s ability to resolve these tickets in time.
If a company receives a lot of tickets during the workday, the number of active tickets will generally be high. So, a good way to resolve this is by increasing your team or finding ways to hasten resolutions. The metric is crucial for your workload management, and a slowly increasing number of active tickets might indicate high employee fatigue.
6. SLA Adherence
When a company starts working with a provider, they sign a service-level agreement or SLA. This document indicates the provider’s obligations toward the client and what kind of service they have to provide. Failing to meet the contractual obligation can lead to penalties while destroying the provider’s reputation.
SLA adherence ratio is specifically important for clients. It shows them whether or not their partner can hold their end of the bargain and provide excellent service.
7. Customer Satisfaction
IT providers also use various customer satisfaction metrics to gauge what clients think of them. Besides using star scoring, you can use open and closed-ended questions and various questionnaires. Providers can inquire users about all sorts of things, such as issue handling, resolution speed and efficiency, and overall satisfaction.
8. Recurring Incidents
In many cases, the problem doesn’t go away after the initial resolution. Instead, it might reappear several times over, which can be a major cause for concern and can potentially indicate low employee expertise.
With this metric, a company can detect patterns and find underlying issues they might’ve missed the first time over. Besides providing information about the team’s performance, a high number of recurring incidents might indicate that the IT provider should take a more proactive stance during their interventions.
Last Thoughts
ITSM metrics are valuable elements of the service process. Providers track this data on a daily basis, always looking to improve different aspects of their workflows. However, the metrics are equally as important for clients as they show them what kind of results to expect from an IT company.
Hopefully, after reading this article, you’ll have a better understanding of relevant metrics and how they affect the IT service process.
