Help Desk Manager

Position Summary

Located 45 minutes from the Nations Capital, nestled in a history-rich community of southern Maryland, The College of Southern Maryland (CSM) is a two-time Aspen Award-winning institution (top 15% of Community Colleges) with academic programs in over 100 disciplines. CSM is among Americas top 100 producers of Minority Associate Degrees in twenty categories, according to Diverse Issues in Higher Education. CSM offers excellent health insurance benefits; State Retirement Pension plan; wellness programs; Code Green early closure Fridays in the summer; college closure for spring break and several major holidays, including the week between Christmas and New Year; and for several days in March for Spring Break. We are an innovative institution committed to student success and well known for our flexibility to meet student and community needs.

The Help Desk Manager plays a pivotal role in the successful operation of the Information Management and Technology (IMT) Divisions Help Desk. This position is responsible for leading a team of technicians, providing excellent customer service along with operational and technical support for service request resolution and incident response, ensuring alignment with the organization's goals and objectives. The Help Desk Manager drives operational and technology alignment and leads a diverse customer service team to ensure the alignment of technology support to business needs through strict ticket resolution, queue management, standardized triage workflows, and SLA metric tracking.

The individual in this position provides leadership in the planning and scheduling of the technology support team and is responsible for leading Help Desk-related initiatives that strengthen campus-wide IT services. The Help Desk Manager provides leadership in key areas of IT operations and ensures IT organizational effectiveness. This position is responsible and accountable for providing comprehensive KPI reporting. The Help Desk Manager completes performance evaluations for the Help Desk Team, including IMT Temps.

Reports to: Technology Services Coordinator

The hiring salary for this position will be from the min to mid-point of the salary range advertised. This position is open until filled.

Specific Duties and Responsibilities

30% Troubleshooting & Escalation Management:

• Apply the IT Priority & Severity Matrix to objectively classify tickets (P1-P4) and meet targeted response and resolution SLAs.
• Resolves service requests immediately via telephone or assigns as work orders for timely action.
• Escalates service requests to Network/Projects team (third level) when necessary.
• Enforce strict escalation thresholds, ensuring that Tier 1 tickets are effectively "packaged" with proper documentation before being handed off.
• Collaborate with other IMT departments to ensure timely ticket resolution and provide customer feedback to the appropriate internal teams, ie Network/Cyber Security.

25% Leadership, Management & Daily Operations:

• Manage Help Desk team and evaluate their performance utilizing data from daily metric reviews and SLA tracking.
• Lead high-energy, daily morning stand-up huddles to address system health, overnight outages, staffing coverage, and daily priorities.
• Actively manage the ticket queue, ensuring unassigned tickets are promptly routed and monitoring for "stale" tickets to prevent bottlenecks.
• Develop daily, weekly and monthly reports on help desk teams productivity and use this data to justify staffing needs and track success.
• Serve as primary escalation point for service requests and incidents.

25% Training & Quality Assurance:

• Conduct regular Quality Assurance (QA) reviews by sampling closed tickets and calls to monitor technical accuracy and customer service tone.
• Provide "micro-coaching" and continuous feedback loops to frontline staff to maintain high service standards.
• Develop and implement plans, processes, and procedures for the Information Technology Services help desk, including standardized triage logic flows (e.g., the "5 to 10-Minute Rule") to train staff on resolving issues quickly.
• Recruit, train and support Help Desk representatives and technicians, ensuring they are proficient in utilizing and developing the Knowledge Base (KB).
• Assist in developing and maintaining proper documentation for desktop computing resources and help develop and document solutions to common user issues and concerns.

20% Stakeholder Communication & Customer Service:

• Maintain timely and accurate customer service on a daily basis by establishing best practices through the entire technical support process.
• Handle direct requests and escalations from department heads, Deans, and VIPs, ensuring proactive de-escalation and relationship management.
• Draft and distribute campus-wide communications regarding system outages, upcoming maintenance, or critical P1 incidents.
• Contribute to improving customer support by actively responding to queries and handling complaints.
• Ensure a smooth transition of services by managing the End-of-Day (EOD) Handover Checklist and preventing overnight ticket backlog.

Additional Duties:

• Performs other related duties as assigned.