The most critical and essential IT support skill your business requires is the skill to service and support the individual needs and demands of your staff. Understanding how to troubleshoot a sluggish computer, or why a specific printer is not working, is an invaluable skill for your business. Having this knowledge is also a plus if you want to develop close professional relationships with your employees. You can teach them valuable lessons in customer care, organization, time management, and other important IT skills. If you offer this training as part of your annual IT support packages, you will gain valuable expertise that can help your business tremendously.
Another skill your IT support team must possess is the skill to explain the basics of computer software. IT support is broken down into three different groups, which include the hardware, software, and network providers. Your support team needs to be very familiar with each of these three areas in order to do its job effectively. If your business depends on the smooth running of its computer software, you cannot afford to have a team that does not understand the basics of how it all works.
In order to train your IT support staff on the basics of computer network and desktop support, consider taking a previous knowledge assessment test.
This will allow your IT department to get a comprehensive overview of their employees’ previous knowledge. Taking an assessment test prior to hiring provides you with one of the best ways to get a handle on the skills of your IT support staff. When they learn the basics of network and desktop support issues, they are better able to help resolve your customers’ IT support issues.
There are two main categories of IT support skills: Linux and Windows. There are many different skills that involve using either Linux or Windows and depending on what types of software your business utilizes, you may need to take a skills test in order to determine the most effective skill sets for your IT department. Here are some of the key highlights of each of the major operating systems for IT professionals to master:
Networking and troubleshooting are some of the most important IT Support skills.
Both of these skills will be required when handling email servers, file servers, and networked components in your business. If you do not know how to properly access the necessary hardware or how to troubleshoot a problem with a piece of hardware, you could lose a lot of time trying to make it work. Even if you use Linux as your operating system, there are plenty of tutorials available to teach network usage.
Knowledge of Windows XP Home Edition is probably the most common type of operating system knowledge that you will require for handling the different Windows support issues that occur in a typical business environment. There are still plenty of tutorials available online that teach people the basics of this popular computer operating system. The biggest issue that most businesses face with Windows computers is registry issues. Registry issues are one of the most frustrating aspects of using any Windows operating system. If you can master the basics of Windows XP Home Edition, you will have no problem effectively handling most support issues that come up with computers that use Windows as their main operating system.
Courses on Windows Vista can sometimes be challenging for IT professionals who lack previous experience or knowledge of this popular computer system. Most IT professionals tend to stick to Windows XP or Windows Vista because of their familiarity with these two previous versions. However, new threats and software applications are constantly being developed for Microsoft products. A majority of these new software applications will have bugs in them that will be difficult to track down and fix. This is where IT professionals who have previous experience in Microsoft products will have a leg up over beginners or people who are learning their skills for the first time. Courses on Microsoft operating systems will focus on scanning, diagnosing, and repairing the various problems that new software applications can cause in a typical Windows system.
IT professionals looking to gain IT support skills will have the best chance at gaining this knowledge through courses on Microsoft Windows XP Home Edition.
- These courses will teach individuals not only the basics of Windows but all the advanced features that come along with this operating system.
- IT professionals looking to improve their IT support skills will have a huge advantage over others when they take advantage of a course that covers the basics of Windows XP and then goes into more detail with Microsoft’s latest products.
- IT professionals who take advantage of these courses can then gain lifetime access to the source code for any Microsoft product they need to resolve a software issue quickly and easily.