One interesting characteristic of Millenials noted in the report is that they tend to rely on their own resources and network of friends or colleagues to try and solve problems before going down the official support path. This is an important point to note for IT departments that need to support Millemials: they are prime candidates both for self- help solutions and for collaborative problem-solving and training. As Card explains, “Forward-thinking IT managers will gear solutions and policies around those concepts, and engineer FAQs or self-help portals that behave like search, social networks or forums.”

The report also looks into Millenials’ use of technology. Unsurprisingly for a generation that grew up with mobile phones and ubiquitous Internet access, it found that Millennials use mobile and home devices for work, and that significant numbers of Millennials work at least part of the time from home, are extremely mobile and like to use their preferred choice of devices. Forward-thinking companies can boost employee satisfaction by respecting their preferred choice of devices; the report notes that a quarter of Millennials said the type of devices supplied by employers strongly affected their job satisfaction, and nearly half said it had at least some influence.

To get the full report, head over to GigaOM Pro (a subscription is required, but a free trial is available). Card’s report is actually only the first of two parts; it will be interesting to read the second part, which will examine how prepared corporate IT departments are to cater for the needs of their growing ranks of Millennial employees.

Related research and analysis from GigaOM Pro:
Subscriber content. Sign up for a free trial.

• The rise of tablets in the enterprise
• The Future of Workplaces

Read the manuals and related documents first. By referring beforehand to your manuals, warranty, receipts and other documents, you’ll be prepared when you contact tech support. You’ll know the scope of your warranty, and you can try suggested troubleshooting methods before asking for outside help.

Have a record of all your communication details. Make it a habit to note the time and means of contact, whether it’s through phone, email or an online support ticket. If you’ve made contact with an agent, ask for their name. Doing this makes previous communication easy to refer to if you’re talking to another agent or if you were promised certain solutions — such as equipment replacement, a technician coming to your home, cutting penalty fees, etc. — that had poor follow-through.

Be as specific and concise as you can be. This prevents you from wasting time with back-and-forth communication on something that can be fixed with one exchange. “It won’t work!” is vague and unhelpful to the person who’s trying to help you resolve the issue. Note the specific error messages you’ve received, as well as the solutions you’ve tried on your own.

Be fair to the person on the other end of the line. Unless the support agent is rude or obnoxious, it’s unfair to vent your frustrations by yelling or whining at them. The problem may lie in the equipment itself, or even in the communication methods implemented by the support team (I know that some people get impatient when they are asked to verify their identity before anyone tries to solve their issue). It’s rare that the problem is the agent per se. Also, you’re likely to get better service by being polite.

Make phone support your last option. If you can find the help you need through online forums, manuals, or by opening online support tickets, you should try these options first before using the phone. Phone support tends to be time consuming, and more often than not you’re forced into an inefficient phone tree, or are put on hold for an hour or so. When you do use the phone, make sure that you’re prepared before the call. Keep any relevant documents ready and know how to explain your issue in as few words as possible.

Give feedback on the service when you can. Any type of feedback, whether positive or negative, is helpful to the overall support process. Just make sure that you send it to the right person. If you have a problem with an inefficient billing staff, complaining about it to the sales department won’t help.

Communicating with tech support doesn’t always have to be a nightmare. By being well prepared, we can make the process as efficient and as painless as possible.

Do you have negative experiences calling tech support? What could you have done to prevent them?

Image by Ray7775 from sxc.hu

Related research and analysis from GigaOM Pro:
Subscriber content. Sign up for a free trial.

• Why iPad 2 Will Lead Consumers Into the Post-PC Era
• The Near-Term Evolution of Social Commerce
• Content Farms: The Players, The Benefits, The Risks

Besides, wouldn’t you rather solve your problems instead of waiting for a live support person to pick up the phone and sweeten you up, telling you how important you are and how the company wants to provide you with the very best service possible. Yadda yadda … just ask me what my problem is already!

Here are 10 steps to becoming your own Mr. or Ms. Fix-it:

1. Reboot or power off/on. This applies to computers, mobile devices, printers, routers and other electronics. It even works on my DVR when it freezes. For PCs, shut them down before rebooting, if you can. If the computer freezes and won’t budge after enough time passes, turn it off for a few minutes before turning it back on.
2. Run anti-virus and anti-spyware software, and keep it up to date. For some of you, this is probably a no-brainer. Sadly, I’ve heard stories of people with problems who were many updates behind, or they forgot they turned off the software and never turned it back on. Most standard anti-virus apps can run a full-system scan at least once a week. Make sure yours does.
3. Check cables and switches. Just last week, my son told me his laptop wouldn’t work. I checked the adapter and it was fine. It turned out the surge protector wasn’t switched on.
4. Know how to save and import files in different formats. When Office 2007 was released, people in my community emailed me because they couldn’t open the .docx, .pptx and .xlsx files it uses. Easy fix: download the free Office Compatibility Pack from Microsoft. Those with Office 2007 can change the default save file format back to .doc, .ppt and .xls. There are some fairly standard formats, like vCard and CSV files, that you can import and export into many different applications: Outlook, Gmail, Apple Address Book, Excel and more. Make “File > Save as” your friend. You can almost never go wrong in converting files to Adobe Acrobat (.pdf) format as virtually everyone can open and view them. Many free sites and apps can covert your files.
5. Visit manufacturer and developer web sites. Software not behaving? Hardware acting wonky? Go to the web site of the developer or manufacturer to search the knowledge base or support pages. You can often find the answers here without having to call support. Or if you can’t find the answers, email support. It’s often less time consuming (if you don’t need an immediate answer) because you don’t wait on anyone or sit through long questions. But before you do that, try #6.
6. Search the web for a solution. Bloggers often receive emails from people asking for help with a problem, just because they once blogged about the product or service — don’t be tempted to go down this route! Save yourself a step and go straight to the resource or an already published answer. If the manufacturer or developer web site doesn’t have the answer, search the web. I’ve found many solutions on other web sites. Make your search as specific as possible. If you receive an error message, copy/paste the error text (if possible) or write it down (or take a screen shot), and use it in your search query, along with the name of the application or other relevant information.
7. Rule out other possibilities. Tech support people and programmers do this all the time. Let’s say you keep receiving a pop-up message that your USB drive could perform faster on a USB 2.0 port, as happened to me recently. A few things come to mind: The USB drive is broken; the USB port is broken; the drivers need updating. Now, I could still open the files on the USB drive, so I didn’t think it was broken. For this same reason, I knew the USB port wasn’t broken. Before trying complicated debugging, I located another USB drive and plugged it in; the error message didn’t show up. Problem solved: it was the  cheap USB drive causing the problem. I switched to a newer one and haven’t had a problem since.
8. Watch Wi-Fi use. Keep your credit card and other personal information off public Wi-Fi connections, which have little security. Limit what you log into while on Wi-Fi. In other words, checking your bank account can wait until you find a more secure connection.
9. Uninstall and reinstall the application. Sometimes an application can become corrupted. After exhausting all other options, re-install the app.
10. Sync and backup everything. I recently lost a file (yes, just lost it). Luckily, I had a back-up on an external drive, so I just copied it back to my computer. I sync my personal information manager with Google Calendar and Contacts and my BlackBerry. When someone’s contact information disappears from one of the resources, I had it on another. With many syncing tools and options available, you can make sure never lose any data. Not only do I have an external drive, but also I use an online backup services.

While a phone call to tech support sounds faster than finding the answers yourself, it doesn’t always work out that way. You can solve many problems within a few minutes using these steps. The best parts? There’s no waiting, no working through someone’s idea of a script, no redoing the steps you’ve already done, and no listening to awful hold music. You’re your best tech support person.

What tech support tricks do you use?

Photo credit: Joe Zlomek

Related research and analysis from GigaOM Pro:
Subscriber content. Sign up for a free trial.

• Why iPad 2 Will Lead Consumers Into the Post-PC Era
• The Near-Term Evolution of Social Commerce
• Content Farms: The Players, The Benefits, The Risks

Is tech support or customer service the web working career for you?

Types of Tech Support and Customer Service Careers

Tech support and customer service jobs don’t just involve working directly with customers using a product or service. Brian Roberts of nesaru consulting, for example, acts as the focal point for communications between his clients and their U.S. customers, service centers, sales groups, distributors.

Here are three general careers in tech support and customer service:

Customer service: Provides support for products and services including set up, repair, training, distribution and other logistics.

Tech support: Solves technical problems, remove malware, and provide help with applications. Jobs may involve specializing in several areas, depending on the business and its products or services.

Trainer: Show users how to use business applications. Training may be included in the responsibilities of someone working in tech support or customer service. In addition to offering tech support to clients, tech “go to” guy and WebWorkerDaily writer Scott Blitstein conducts training.

How to Qualify

Tech support pros often begin learning the job by taking care of their own computer problems and becoming the “go to” resource for family and friends. “I have been a technology innovator for almost 30 years. I love learning about new technology; it was fun to roll up my sleeves and learn about VoIP long before it was easy (like 10 years ago),” says F. Andy Seidl, president and co-founder of MyST Technology Partners, Inc.

In his role as founder and president of eSeMBe Technical Services, Scott Blitstein provides technical support services for clients. His experience comes from a combination of formal training, self-teaching and collaborating. “I do a lot of reading and internal testing to stay up to date and comfortable with current technology,” he says.

These jobs often involve interfacing directly with customers, so people skills matter. Managers often say they’d rather hire those with people skills first than those with tech support knowledge, because you can’t teach people skills. Another important trait is patience, as customers often feel frustrated or aggravated and take it out on the first representative they speak with from the company. Representatives not only deal with the physical problem of a product or service, but also the customer.

Tech Support and Customer Service Tools

People in this career rely on specific applications that help them review and identify problems. For example, computer tech support workers use remote control software such as LogMeIn, CrossLoop and NTRsupport Pro to access a customer’s PC to see and fix problems. Of course, a fast Internet connection is a must and headset comes in handy so you can free your hands for heavy-duty keyboarding and mousing. Customer support staff often also rely on a support ticketing app.

They also use many of the common web worker tools: Skype, instant messaging, Basecamp or other project management application and online meeting tools like GoToMeeting.

Find Clients

Word-of-mouth marketing continues to be the leader for lead generation in these fields. F. Andy Seidl finds his company’s primary sources for leads come from the company web site, and via resellers and value-added resellers (VARs).

Cold calling still works, as Brian Roberts attests, and so does face-to-face marketing. “We network a lot in international trade events to identify potential clients and have developed a community of companies and people with complementary skills and services we can offer to our clients,” says Roberts.

Would you consider a tech support or customer service career?

Photo credit: c ps

Related research and analysis from GigaOM Pro:
Subscriber content. Sign up for a free trial.

• Why iPad 2 Will Lead Consumers Into the Post-PC Era
• The Near-Term Evolution of Social Commerce
• Content Farms: The Players, The Benefits, The Risks

Today, we offer The Website is Down‘s dramatization of that most epic of clashes — the sales guy versus the web dude. Told from the perspective of the Web Guy’s monitor, this breakdown of office relations will seem all too familiar to those on either side of the screen.

Related research and analysis from GigaOM Pro:
Subscriber content. Sign up for a free trial.

• Report: The Future of Netbooks!
• Windows 7 Forecast: Mostly Sunny, With a Chance of Showers
• Why iPad 2 Will Lead Consumers Into the Post-PC Era