In today’s digital age, technology plays a critical role in school operations, teaching, learning, and the school community as a whole. As such, the quality and reliability of IT services offered to staff, students, and administrators has a significant impact on the overall effectiveness and efficiency of the school’s functions. Whether it’s troubleshooting tech issues, providing support for new software, processes for the procurement of technology , or ensuring that the school’s IT infrastructure runs smoothly, gathering feedback on IT services can be a game changer as they can help identify areas of improvement, highlight strengths, and guide future technology decisions.
Collecting feedback to improve outcomes, however, isn’t just about getting a “thumbs up” or “thumbs down”, or some other generic approval rating. It’s about understanding the user experience, pinpointing the pain points, and making data-driven decisions to enhance IT services.
In this article, we’ll discuss the importance of collecting feedback on IT services, provide some tools and strategies to collect it effectively, and share best practices for using the feedback to improve your IT services and support.
Benefits of Collecting Feedback on IT Services and Support
Identify Strengths and Weaknesses
Feedback provides a direct line to understanding what’s working well and what’s not. IT services and support may be meeting expectations in some areas but falling short in others. Through structured feedback, school administrators and IT teams can uncover issues they might not have otherwise realized existed and highlight where their services shine. For example, while your helpdesk team might be receiving positive feedback on their responsiveness or friendliness, there might be complaints about the resolution time for certain technical issues. This insight will help prioritize improvements in specific areas.
Increase User Satisfaction
When schools actively seek feedback, it fosters a sense of trust and communication between IT staff and the users within the school community. By addressing concerns and making necessary adjustments, the IT team can boost user satisfaction and create a more positive technology experience for all stakeholders. This is particularly important when dealing with non-technical users, such as teachers and administrative staff, who may not feel comfortable troubleshooting issues themselves.
Promote Continuous Improvement
Feedback is a tool and an input for continuous improvement. Technology as a whole is constantly evolving, and so are the needs of your school community. Collecting feedback on IT services and support is an ongoing process that helps IT teams stay on top of emerging issues and adapt to changes, whether those are new educational tools, changes in school policies, new compliance requirements, a changing cyber threat landscape, or general upgrades to existing systems.
Inform Future Technology Decisions
When making decisions about new software, hardware, or services, it’s essential to understand how existing IT services are being received. Feedback from users can guide IT decision-makers when choosing future solutions and/or vendors. For example, if there’s widespread dissatisfaction with the current Learning Management System (LMS), the IT team can prioritize exploring new systems or providing additional training to address identified gaps.
Tools and Strategies to Collect Feedback on IT Services and Support
Surveys and Questionnaires
One of the most effective and common methods for collecting feedback is through surveys. Online surveys can reach a wide audience quickly and provide quantitative data that is easy to analyze. You can use survey tools like Google Forms, Microsoft Forms, SurveyMonkey, Typeform, ZoHo Forms, etc. to create short and focused questionnaires that gather insights from students, teachers, staff, and other members of the school community. Note that if you are using these tools to collect any personal identifying information (PII) you should be evaluate them for compliance with any applicable data privacy regulations.
Questions to Include:
- General Satisfaction: How satisfied are you with the current IT services provided by the school?
- Response Time: How would you rate the responsiveness of the IT support team when you report an issue?
- Issue Resolution: Was your IT issue resolved effectively and in a timely manner?
- Technology Usefulness: How easy is it to use the technology tools provided (e.g., LMS, email systems, etc.)?
- Suggestions: Do you have any suggestions for improving the current IT services?
Surveys provide a structured way to gather feedback and can be tailored to the specific needs of your school’s IT services.
Focus Groups and Interviews
For a deeper understanding of the feedback, you can hold focus groups or one-on-one interviews with selected users. These discussions provide qualitative insights and allow IT staff and leadership to probe deeper into specific issues or concerns. Teachers, administrators, or even students can share their experiences and offer suggestions for improving IT services and support.
Focus groups allow for open discussion, where users may feel more comfortable expressing concerns that they might not have communicated in a survey. IT staff can use these opportunities to gather more context, such as any challenges users face when using technology or areas where they need additional training or support.
Helpdesk Tickets and Service Logs
Tracking and analyzing helpdesk tickets and service logs is another way to collect valuable feedback. By reviewing the types of issues reported, how quickly they were resolved, and the feedback on resolutions, you can identify patterns and recurring issues. This method allows IT teams to assess the most common problems users face and how effective their responses have been.
Helpdesk ticket data can be supplemented with follow-up surveys that request feedback on the quality of the support provided. For example, after a helpdesk interaction, you could ask:
- How satisfied were you with the support you received from the helpdesk team?
- Was your issue resolved on the first contact?
Direct Feedback Channels
Creating direct feedback channels for users to submit suggestions or complaints is critical for continuous improvement. This can be as simple as providing an email address, a contact form on the IT department’s webpage, or even a dedicated Slack or TEAMS channel where users can report issues in real time. It’s important that these feedback channels remain accessible and visible to staff, teachers, and students. This approach can help ensure that users feel empowered to provide feedback whenever they need to.
Analytics and Usage Data
If your school uses software platforms or digital tools for education and administration, you can also leverage usage data to assess the effectiveness of these technologies. For example, tracking the frequency of use or identifying tools that are underutilized could indicate where users are encountering difficulties or simply not finding value. Similarly, monitoring system performance through analytics can give insight into issues like frequent outages or slow load times, which may affect user experience and school operations.
Best Practices for Collecting Actionable Feedback on IT Services and Support
Ensure Anonymity
To encourage honest and candid feedback, ensure that the feedback process is anonymous (where possible). Users are more likely to provide constructive criticism if they don’t fear repercussions or judgment. Anonymous surveys or helpdesk tickets can reduce barriers and foster more honest conversations.
Be Specific in Your Questions
Avoid vague questions in your surveys or interviews. Being specific helps to gather actionable insights. For example, rather than asking, “Are you satisfied with the IT services?” ask, “How satisfied are you with the timeliness of responses from the IT helpdesk?” This allows users to provide more detailed feedback that can guide actionable improvement efforts.
Act on the Feedback
Gathering feedback is only valuable when/if you act on it. After collecting responses, prioritize issues that impact the majority of users or that have significant operational consequences for the school. Communicate with your school community about any changes that will be made based on the feedback received. When users see that their input leads to improvements, they will be more likely to continue participating in the feedback process.
Regularly Collect Feedback
Collecting feedback should not be a one-time event. Regularly collecting feedback allows IT teams and ledership to track improvements over time, identify emerging issues, and continuously enhance services and support. Whether it’s quarterly surveys or monthly check-ins, make feedback collection a part of your school’s IT strategy.
In Conclusion
Collecting feedback on IT services and support is an essential strategy for improving user satisfaction, optimizing performance, and making data-driven decisions about future technology investments. By using a combination of surveys, interviews, helpdesk data, direct feedback channels and other tools, schools can better understand the needs and concerns of their users. The key is to act on the feedback and continuously monitor how IT services and support are meeting the needs of teachers, students, staff, and other members of the school community.
This process of feedback collection and response can create a culture of collaboration between the IT department and school stakeholders, leading to a more efficient and positive experience for everyone involved, as well as improved student outcomes.
