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There is some Inertia in the time Between When A Software Support Engineer Works on a Case and When a Software Support Engineer Logs a Case
There is some inertia in the time between when a Software Support Engineer works on a case and when a Software Support Engineer logs the case notes for that case.
A question that arises in this scenario is, at what point is the Software Support Engineer’s task complete? The correct answer is that the progressing of the case and the logging of the case notes is all one task, and the task isn’t complete until both parts have been done. Furthermore the two parts are insepearable– in other words, I’m positing that until both parts are complete, *no work has been performed* This may sound counterintuitive! But in a system where management gets 100% of their information about a Support Engineer performance through the logged case notes, unless the notes are logged, it actually equates to the Support Engineer not having performed any work. By the counter-token, if notes are logged without having performed a task — if notes are logged without having progressed a software support case — then the Support Engineer also is in a situation where *no work has been performed*.
The inertia that I’m talking about happens at that moment where the case has been progressed between the Software Support Engineer and the client, for example a half-hour-long conference call where the case was progressed. At this moment someone who doesn’t know better might think that work has been done. However that’s not so– the case notes must be logged. Consider this inertia. In other words, if one doesn’t know about this inertia and its effects, then they might not be doing their job. In fact, I might consider this the “third element”, or component, of performing customer software support engineering case work — the first is progressing the case with the customer, the second is overcoming the inertia to push through to complete the case notes, and the third element/component is the actual act of completing the case notes. In software customer support engineering, this 1-2-3 combo must be bundled together and done as a unit, every single time a case is handled, in order for work to really have been
performed.
Edit: This post was previously published at: w̶i̶e̶l̶d̶l̶i̶n̶u̶x̶.̶c̶o̶m̶/2016-06-01-support-progress-logs-inertia.php
[2019 edit: Moved to: https://i̶n̶v̶e̶s̶t̶o̶r̶w̶o̶r̶k̶e̶r̶.̶c̶o̶m̶/2016/... .html.]