A recent Scientific American article discusses the way in which we make snap judgments about people based on their warmth and competence. In it, the author describes how recent research is showing that people all over the world form their initial impression of you based on warmth and competence. Stereotypes feed these impressions, but they do not account for the whole first impression. The research also shows how a gain in one area leads to a loss in the other. For instance, people who are warm are assumed to be less competent than people who are cold. That must be why so many computer consultants treat their small business computer support customers so poorly. They must believe that appearing cold will also make them appear more competent.

Here at Port-to-Port Consulting, we're willing to take that chance. Our entire IT support services staff is committed to treating our network support customers kindly. We understand that most people are a little anxious or perturbed during most of their interactions with us. They either have a problem that is getting in the way of their work success, or they are trying to make a purchase decision based on limited understanding of the options. We strive first to put our computer network services customers at ease. I guess this research means we risk giving them a first impression of incompetence. So be it.

Our primary goal in providing Information Technology services in Indianapolis is to help our customers get better at what they do. We can't start helping if we aren't approachable.

I attended an event last evening at the home of local entrepreneur and philanthropist Scott Jones. The gathering was to introduce Lemonade Day to Indianapolis. My schedule required me to arrive late and leave early. I did get to see the entire presentation and am still wondering about my involvement in Lemonade Day. However, things went bad when I tried to leave. I was the first person to give my parking ticket to the valets. Several more people came out shortly after me and before long a steady trickle of people were departing.

It didn't strike me as strange when the first car to pull up was not mine. I started to be a bit concerned when the fifth one arrived and still I hadn't seen mine. It became ridiculous when I had been standing in the rain for 30 minutes without getting my car. The valets kept telling me they were getting my car, but it was obvious to everyone that they weren't. Finally, after 45 minutes and several polite requests for information, they told me that they couldn't get my car to start. You can't imagine how furious that made me.

The whole ordeal reminded me of one of the important tenets we hold here at Port-to-Port Consulting. We always tell our small business computer support customers the bad news as soon as we know it. They most likely are going to find out sooner or later, so why not tell them right away. Besides, they might be able to help. In the network support business, there are going to be problems. Companies that outsource their IT support services know that as well. They also know what is most critical and can help prioritize in a pinch.

I walked to my car in disgust, got in, turned the steering wheel a quarter turn, and started my car. I waited 45 minutes to find out that something was wrong that only took 10 seconds to correct. I hope these young men learned something from the experience. I'll get my own car next time.

In the grand scheme of things, the thing that we do at our Indianapolis small business computer support company is to help our customers do whatever they do a little bit better. Often, particularly with new network support customers, that amounts to nothing more than keeping their computer network running without crashes. After we've worked with them for a while, that becomes less exciting to them because they become accustomed to the idea that their business computer system should work without unplanned down time. That's when we have to start working to earn our keep.

Sometimes we do obvious things like informing our computer consulting customers about the status of their IT system. We keep them up to date on the age and status of their equipment and help plan replacements, refreshments, and upgrades as they go about budgeting. At other times, we move a bit out of the normal things considered outsourced computer support to areas like online marketing and social media. Every now and then we really step outside the normal envelope and do research that only touches computer support because it's done online. A recent example was a question posed to me by a customer who received several gift cards from friends and vendors at Christmas. He knew he would never visit many of these stores and wanted to know if there were options other than "re-gifting" these cards.

We took the challenge and, believe it or not, there is another option. We found a website, giftcardrescue.com, that allows you to trade in your gift cards for cash or other cards. Sure, my customer could have spent a few minutes online himself and perhaps found this site. I could have told him that I didn't know of anything other than re-gifting and moved on to my next task. But the reality of our outsourced computer service is that we do what our customers need us to do so that they can be more productive. Besides, now that I've found this option, I can share it with the rest of my Indianapolis computer consulting customers and perhaps help them with a small problem as well.

I met with a prospective new small business computer network support customer this morning. As we talked about the IT services we provide thru our Pertingo^® Computer Support Service, the application of Dragon Dictate came up. I had to admit that this was an area of Information Technology that had not progressed as quickly as I had expected it to do. I was predicting in the early 1990s that we'd all be talking to our computers like the folks on the Starship Enterprise by the mid-90s. I was wrong by more than a decade so far. While the current version of Dragon Dictate and many of its competitors will do a pretty decent job of allowing you to dictate documents, none of them are particularly good at allowing you to control your PC using your voice.

Imagine my surprise when I get back to the office and discover that researchers at the University of North Florida have moved from voice recognition to thought recognition. That's right. They've connected two epilepsy patients to a computer via electrocorticography (ECoG). The process requires drilling a hole in your skull so it probably won't catch on too quickly. However, the results were nearly 100 percent accurate.

As exciting as this research may be for some, it still doesn't solve the real problem with voice recognition. The English language (and any other popular human language) is too complicated for a computer to learn. It can recognize the words, but it cannot discern meaning from them. That's why dictation is fairly simple and highly accurate but understanding is about zero. Talking to your computer is still a good decade or more away. But I'll keep hoping.

I recently read a blog post titled Excuses are Not a Customer Service Policy. In it, the author describes a bad breakfast experience with friends. The post wasn't as interesting as its title, but it made me think about the way in which most computer network services companies behave toward their customers. It's amazing how most people think that a customer who has been mistreated in some way wants to hear excuses for the abuse. In most instances, the customer wants an apology first and a resolution second. If these two are adequate to save the relationship, then she might want to hear the excuse.

At Port-to-Port Consulting, we recognize this and we try very hard not to make excuses for the mistakes that occur in the process of providing computer support to our Indianapolis area customers. We know that things will often go wrong in IT support services. That's the reason we have a Help Desk in the first place. However, one of our main tenets is to avoid escalating the problem by tossing out lame excuses, or worse, telling our customers what they did wrong. Sometimes the problem is created by a customer who improperly uses his computer, but it doesn't get fixed by us throwing that in his face. So we don't.

Good Information Technology consulting requires a solid working relationship. My network technicians often find themselves taking the blame for something that may not have been our fault. Finding fault doesn't fix problems. The faster we can get past that point, the sooner we can start helping our customers move forward again. Besides, if they hired us to manage their computer network services and they aren't working properly for any reason, isn't that ultimately our fault?

One of the computer network service technicians here at Port-to-Port Consulting just returned from a training class in Tampa, Florida. One of his complaints about spending time in Tampa was that it seemed to him that everything closed around 5:00 PM each day. I explained to him that the majority of people living in Tampa are old (Data bears me out on this one.) and tend to get inside early for the evening. Businesses start closing early because the bulk of their customers go home early.

It struck me that this is an important element in becoming a successful business computer support company. There are things about your target market that are specific to them and quite different from other categories of businesses. This is why we focus ALL of our efforts on Indianapolis small businesses. The difference between the needs of a 30 person law firm and the legal department at Wellpoint is stark. It's nearly impossible to handle the information technology needs of a 40 person real estate company while also worrying about the needs of the City of Carmel.

I'm often asked why we don't go after the network support business of some of our community's larger companies. My answer always revolves around this idea. If I serve large and small customers, whenever there is a conflict between them, the little guy is almost bound to lose. Besides, working with Indianapolis area small businesses allows us to see the impact we have as we help their businesses grow.

According to new media marketing firm Penn Olson, these are the top 10 questions posed to Ask.com in 2009:

1. How much should I weigh?
2. How do I get out of debt fast?
3. How do I get pregnant?
4. What is Miley Cyrus’ phone number?
5. What is Twitter?
6. What is the meaning of life?
7. When will the world end?
8. How long does marijuana stay in your system?
9. What are symptoms of Swine Flu?
10. What time is it?

Most of those questions indicate something bad about the confidence many of us place in the power of the Internet. The list did make me think about the kinds of questions that get asked at our computer help desk. Rather than list the top 10, I'm offering up the 10 I hope we never hear again:
 

1. I didn't do what you told me, but can you fix it now that it's broken?
2. If I didn't put in my backup tape, can you still restore my files?
3. Can I keep using my computer after the power goes out?
4. Should I have called you before I clicked OK on that popup?
5. The salesman said it would be easy. Why can't you make it work?
6. I just sent out an email to a couple thousand people and now I'm getting bouncebacks. Can you look at it?
7. So I wasn’t supposed to open that Hallmark e-card?
8. What do you mean I’m not supposed to work out of my deleted items folder?
9. Is this trojan message good or bad?
10. I didn't do anything. Why isn't it working?

Our Indianapolis IT outsourcing company fields dozens of calls every day at the Help Desk. We know that each caller us a customer with an issue that is unique to them, and we do all we can to help them. There are times when we wish we could have gotten to them sooner, but we understand that they use our IT services because this stuff is a bit foreign to them. If all of these questions stopped being asked, we'd have another 10 that we wish we didn't hear. Our favorite thing to hear is, "Thank you for fixing my problem."

 

When I was in the Air Force I would sometimes come home and, within a few minutes of being there, my wife would say to me, "You spent a lot of time with Colonel Jones today didn't you?" The first few times I would acknowledge that I had and wonder how she knew. I thought perhaps his cologne leached onto me and she could smell it. Eventually I had to ask. She said, "Whenever you spend time with Col Jones, you come home cussing like a drunken sailor."

She was right. Col Jones was a brilliant man, but he had a mouth like, well, a drunken sailor. It turns out that foul language is not only a way to express agony, but a way to alleviate it as well. Recent studies confirm that people who swear can withstand pain longer than those who don't. That explains why those of us in the computer outsourcing business tend to swear more often than most of our peers. Imagine if you had to spend the bulk of your day dealing with computer tech support from a guy named "Bob" in India? That's the life of a network technician.

Now we don't tend to curse and swear in the presence of our Indianapolis small business computer support customers. We wait until we get back in the safety of our office where the free flow of agony relieving language can be heard at a volume considerably above a whisper. We maintain enough decorum to avoid a comparison to Animal House, but we are accustomed to frequent short bursts of four letter words. Now we know it enhances our ability to withstand the hard parts of IT support services.

While Apple has managed to maintain an image of being virus-impervious, most of us in the computer outsourcing business have always contended that the reason there weren't many native Mac viruses was because there just weren't enough Macs to make it worthwhile for evil hackers to bother with it when there were far more Windows PCs out there to attack. In fact, as the Mac continues to becomes more popular on the Intel platform, I imagine computer help desks all over the country will start to see more infected ones. The popularity of the iPhone (30 million sold and counting) has already attracted some attention. A young man in Australia has written a worm that infects the iPhone while pretending to be a Rick Astley screen saver. I have to admit that I didn't know who Astley was, but this is sure to raise his popularity briefly.

One of the most frequent questions from my Indianapolis small business computer consulting customers is, "What can I do to ensure that my network is safe from hackers?" I always answer the same way: "Disconnect your machines from the Internet."

That's the only way to be sure, and even then you may have a mole in your own organization who ferrets out data on a flash drive. (How about that, two rodents in the same sentence?) Data security is an important element of any good network design. We do all we can to keep our computer network services customers' data safe. The best analogy I can use is your home security. You lock the doors when you leave to keep bad people out. If you feel you're at a higher risk, you turn on an alarm as well. These measures will keep out most burglars or thieves. They'll just move on to the next house in search of one without an alarm or with an unlocked door. However, if the burglar is looking to get something from you in particular, your locks and alarms become a nuisance to him. He'll have to plan better and it will take longer, but if he's committed, he'll get around your reasonable precautions. The same holds true for your network. Practice safe computing and avoid upsetting anyone who might have crazy tech skills.

If those infected iPhone users had practiced safe computing, they wouldn't have jailbroken their phones, and the worm wouldn't have gotten in.

The new Droid smartphone has been on the market for more than a day and I still haven't been to the local Verizon store to play with one. It's rather unusual for me but my schedule was full yesterday and my wife owns my time today. I'll visit during the Colts game when other gadget geeks are working their man-sized remote controls. I'm really excited about the chance to use a phone that has learned from the iPhone success and works on a more reliable network.

Many of my Indianapolis small business computer support customers know that I'm the go-to guy for gadgets, particularly any portable devices. The upcoming holiday season may arrive too soon for the coolest of the rumored gadgets though. It's almost certain that Apple will not unveil their Tablet (iTablet) before the end of the year. If they miss the Christmas rush, it will probably be Jobs' afterthought during his MacWorld keynote in February. The Barnes and Noble Nook, which looked like it had features that would give the Kindle a run, is now bogged down in legal battles. It appears that B&N stole the device from another company. I'm sure there will be tons of new phones and mp3 players soon, but they bore us all any more. It's time for a device that defines a new category. It may just come from Microsoft.

That's right. While the "I'm a Mac" and "I'm a PC" commercials battle for our desktop dollars, the real fight for our souls is going on in the next generation of portables. Even though Apple may not hit the streets with their Tablet, Microsoft will very likely make it to market this year with their new Courier -- I don't know what generic name to call it -- electronic journal. That's right, it's unique enough that it may create a new category.

Fear not, business computer support buyers, I'll be the first kid on the block with one of these new thingy's.

A recent eWeek article recalled the top five priorities of the IT industry. According to Doug Tracy, CIO of Dana Holdings, the top five are:

• Set a Vision
• Manage Vendors
• Improve Process
• Standardize Operations
• Test Open Source

I found this list interesting because it contains the elements of our Pertingo(r) Computer Support service that most of our Indianapolis small business computer outsourcing customers overlook when they are looking for a good computer consultant. We know that our customers use price and convenience as the primary factors in deciding on a computer support service. It isn't until they've had a provider who looks at things like these top five priorities for them that they come to realize the full impact of good IT support services.

• We work with each of our clients to develop a vision for their technology that fits the vision they have for their company as a whole.
• We have always described ourselves as the "one throat to choke" to our customers. We manage the activities of every other provider who touches their computer network.
• We take the time to learn how our customers do their jobs so we can make suggestions to improve the process.
• We strive to standardize, as much as possible, all of the elements of their network.
• We're always playing with something new to see if it has applicability in our customers' IT environments.

In short, we are always working on those top five priorities. Any good IT support services company should do the same. Many don't. Sure, we are also doing those routine things as efficiently as we can. But we don't add value if all we do is fix broken stuff and wait for you to tell us what new stuff you'd like to buy. Our job is to maximize the benefit you get from having bought all this stuff in the first place. That's good IT.

As the customer service rep for our Indianapolis small business computer customers, I listen carfeully to anything they have to say.  I listen to the praise as well as the complaints.  As much as we love the praises, we analyze every complaint or concern from our customers.  One of the issues that we experienced lately relates to our computer help desk.  The service the clients were receiving was fine. The problem was when they received it.  For example, when someone at their office comes in early and finds there is a problem, they would call into the helpdesk.  The helpdesk does not open until 8:00 so the person is not able to get assistance until the helpdesk would call them back about 8:15-8:30.  Port-to-Port has listened and we're changing our hours to start the helpdesk at 7 am. 

A recent story in the New York Times brings up a brand new issue related to teh steadily growing amount of data that we all have online at various Web 2.0 sites like Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, Flickr, and all the others. Every one of those online services has a volume of information about us that we've put online behind a set of usernames and passwords. What happens to that stuff if you die? Does ownership play into divorce proceedings?

Currently no one knows for sure. Most of the online providers have no provision in their agreements to grant access to your heirs or estate. This is not a common issue that comes up in conversations with my Indianapolis small business computer support customers, but it seems it will before long.

The Times story tells of a woman who, thru her avatar in Second Life, married a man and built a happy virtual home. When the man died, the folks at Linden Labs deleted her entire virtual world because the house had been purchased in his name. The poor woman lost her online mate and all of their online possessions. Imagine if that happened in real life!

This is certainly an unusual thing for your computer consulting company to worry about -- until it becomes important to you or your business. We try to stay one step ahead so our customers can maintain their focus on their work.

I have a second grade child that has been excelling at her private christian school.  She has been at this school for the last four years. Before Kindergarten and first grade, I compared what she was being taught in the private school to the public school curriculum. For the first two years the standards were higher at the private school so, I didn't evaluate against the public school for second grade. Boy was I wrong in not doing that!  The private school's standards fell below the public school.  When I approached the school to see why and what needed to be done to challenge my daughter, I was informed that it was too hard and I would need to do all the challenging at home. I challenge my child at home but it does need to be reinforced by the education system. Well the public school has increased what they require the children to know. If I had kept my daughter in the private school she would have been behind and potentionally not able to catch up.

What does this story have to do with computers, consulting, etc.?  It is never bad to evaluate who you are using against other people and services.  If you have a good network support group or computer outsourcing company, they will want to know where they are behind and will want to improve.  If the school had said, "Let's try these things to get back to that higher standard," we would have stayed. We liked the school, we liked the people. As I am sure you are with the people that support your computer network. If you don't like the company that supports you or you don't like the people that support you, maybe you need to evaluate why you use them. If you've talked to them and gotten answers like my private school gave me, you should see what other options are available. My small busines computer support company takes feedback from our customers extremely seriously. We don't take a squeaky wheel approach to it either. We assume that if one company is telling us they have a problem, many are feeling the same pain and we need to make changes quickly.

Don't allow your computer network services company to take your business for granted. Make them work to continue to earn your business. We know that's what our customers expect, and we do all we can to deliver. Every IT consultant in the nation should do the same.

One of mycolleagues and I went to the gym after work the other day to work out.  As the workout went on we both noticed how sore we were becoming but said that's good because it means we are improving ourselves.  It is that way for our Indianapolis small business computer support customers as well.  As their businesses mature and grow, they have to keep exercising them to keep them strong and growing.  Our task as their computer consultants is to work along side them so their technology can change as it needs to.  Sometimes, we are involved in those planning meeting but other times we are not.  Often, people don't realize that a decision they're make directly impacts their computer network and should at least include input from the outsourced IT department.  We have had trouble with a couple of clients lately in this area.  One of them uses email to run their business.  Due to the amount of email they were storing we needed to make changes to their system to allow them to keep the email in the way that they prefer. We attempted to change their behavior by archiving email instead of keeping it. They decided as an organization that they wanted to keep the email. ( As their computer consultants we can only advise them.) So, we spent many late nights dealing with corrupt mail storage to get them working. The reality is that they have outgrown their current configuration and need to do some significant upgrades. So even though the large bill for equipment may be painful, it is necessary for them to continue to grow and develop.

This incident reminded me that they hired us to be their computer consultants. Our not saying something turned out to be more painful than just telling them what they needed to hear and addressing it from there.

I know it isn't spring time and no one really wants to do any cleaning, but just think about how much you enjoy the nice clean straightened out space.  That is exactly what we do for our clients.  We try hard to clean out things as time goes by for our Indianapolis Small Business Computer support customers, but for one reason or another it doesn't always happen.

I had a meeting with one of my Indianapolis small business computer outsourcing customers. She mentioned that they had some old computer stuff that needed to be removed from their office.  A couple of techs were scheduled to pick up the equipment from their office.  Boy were we surprised to find filing cabinets and shelves filled with old IT equipment...two vehicles full of stuff! It took 3 hours and 3 people to go through the stuff to see if there was anything of value.  When we finished, there were a few items that we are keeping for spare parts ( a couple USB keyboards and mice, software and spare monitor).  The client wants to help other organizations as much as they can, we will be formatting the laptops and desktops to be reused at another of our Indianapolis small business computer customers.  

Just like at home, the rooms need to be cleaned out in your offices as well. And even though my boss still has a couple of Apple Newton's in his desk (He says the portable device technology is headed back toward this idea.), most of the stuff you stashed away has no usefulness after it's been put away for more than a few months.

We have all, at some point in time, come across the unnavigable web of customer support in one industry or another.  I have days where I want to pull my hair out because of the run-around that support hotlines give me.  The question for someone like me is:  How do I make small business computer support personal for the customer?

One may argue that large companies that use enormous networks of extensions and endless menu options breed efficiency.  To an extent, this is true.  They're able to weed out what kind of problems customers are having with the products, and then sort them into different departments.  I, for one, do not believe this works as a form of Indianapolis small business computer support.  But what happens when your problem falls within multiple options on a menu?  I'm not sure about you, but there's no key on my phone that says "a little bit of #1 and a little bit of #3."  So, without a person to speak to, how do we really identify the computer issues at hand?

The best way to solve an issue is to outline the symptoms that presented themselves.  The only way a customer can truly do this is if he or she is speaking with a live human being.  As far as I'm concerned, it is the only way to perform customer support.  I receive a myriad of phone calls throughout the day, and I do my best to give a direct answer in relation to the issue.  If I cannot provide an answer, then I ask another live human being in the office.  Everyone is happier when they don't have to argue with an automated operator who cannot tell whether or not you said "tech support" or "wreck the fort."

So to anyone out there who'd like to voice his or her concerns to a real person, my ears are open and ready to assist you.  Here's to live customer support!

When we started doing computer network support as Port-to-Port Consulting in 1991, people didn't have much trouble figuring out the connection between our name and the PC on their desk. Sure, we've had a few troubled souls along the way who wanted to know if we were overseas shippers. We even had one poor man who hoped to rent portable toilets from us. Most, however, had no problem understanding that we were referring to all of those different ports on the back of your machine. As the PC has progressed, the number of ports on the back has gone down considerably. Today you can connect just about everything using only a USB port. So much for a cool business name!

About the only thing that is the same about our Indianapolis small business computer support company is the name. Our logo has changed several times. Nearly 100 people have worked here at one time or another. We've served more than 300 different businesses. And the IT industry has changed so much that we tell stories to our new staff members that sound like our grandparents stories of walking to school in the snow (uphill both ways).

My son turned 21 over the weekend. Thinking about how much he has changed thru the years made me start to think about how much other things have changed. One steady element of central Indiana computer outsourcing has been the people at Port-to-Port Consulting. While there are as many as 60 companies in the Indianapolis area that provide some subset of the services we provide, few of them have been around for more than a few years. Most are the result of recent layoffs. 

It does make me feel old to reminisce about the times we've spent working with Indianapolis small businesses on their Information Technology support. It also makes me proud of the incredible things we've done for our community thru our efforts to keep some of the most vital organizations in the area operating at peak efficiency.

How do you respond when someone tells you your offer is too good to be true? I find it extremely difficult to come up with a response that is acceptable to them. While I know that I wouldn't be making the offer if I couldn't deliver, the other person usually doesn't have enough experience with me to be able to have blind faith in my ability to perform. That leaves me wishing I had made a lesser offer to start with.

This is the situation we often find ourselves dealing with when we propose our Pertingo(r) Computer Support Service to organizations. Inevitably, we play the "Is this included?" game. Even our computer consulting peers make fun of the Pertingo(r) offering. They refer to Port-to-Port Consulting as the "All-You-Can-Eat guys. In a sense we are. We view the agreement between us and our Indianapolis small business computer consulting customers as an employment agreement. We compete more against the single inside guy than we do against the other central Indiana computer outsourcing companies. 

If you hired a guy, you'd expect him to work hard at whatever is required to keep your organization moving forward. We do the same. Sometimes, your inside guy would have to put in extra hours to handle a particularly difficult task. In general, you expect that to be a part of his normal compensation because there will also be times when he has little to do, or he needs to cut out early for a cross country meet or something.

In the final analysis, the Pertingo(r) offer isn't too good to be true. It's a fair deal for everyone. It seems better because it's compared to astronomical hourly rates charged by other IT consultants. We find that by doing more, we're able to avoid the things that consume huge amounts of time. At first, it seems counterintuitive, but think about how much easier it would have been to lose those first few extra pounds instead of waiting until you had dozens of pounds to lose.
 

In 2000, we decided it was time for Port-to-Port Consulting to grow. The economy at the time felt otherwise. As a result, we found ourselves in an unsustainable cash position. We were going broke. Many people start looking at all the things that are wrong when they find themselves in dire situations. I tend to look for the opportunity being presented. The opportunity in our upside down financial situation was to reinvent who we are. In fact, we went so far as to take the first step in reinventing what computer consulting in Indianapolis was.

While our expenses outpaced our revenue, we did have revenue. We evaluated where it was coming from and then sorted it into good and bad piles. We did the same for our clients, and our staff, and all of our regular monthly bills. When we had sorted everything, we looked at the things on the good list and asked, "Can we make a business out of this?" In my mind, I felt that if we could make a business out of the good parts of the one we had, then it was worth the struggle ahead of us to do it because we'd end up with a top notch Indianapolis small business computer outsourcing company. If we couldn't, then we should move quickly to shutting down the company because the only way it could survive was if we created work we did not love.

Happily, we built an IT consulting company that I love. Our Pertingo^® Computer Support Service allowed us to work more closely with the small businesses we help. Keeping the staff members who believed as we did and getting rid of those who didn't made our office a happier place. Eliminating the expenses that were acquired as a result of bad decisions made our books look better and our attitude get rosier.

If the economy hadn't intervened to create a recesion in the Computer Services industry, Port-to-Port would likely be a much larger company today. Damon Richards would likely be much less happy.