Every job within HelpMaster must be assigned to either a person, or a skillgroup. Initially, this assignment is performed as part of the job creation process. Following this, a job may change ownership, or be re-assigned throughout the rest of its lifecycle. Assigning, or re-assigning a job is the process of allocating that job to a certain staff member, or skillgroup for further action.
All job re-assignment is performed via the Action screen.
Assigning a job to a specific staff member is the most direct way to allocate a job. If a job is assigned to a specific helpdesk staff member, the job will appear in their job queue and can be further actioned from there. When a job is assigned to a specific staff member, by default it is also assigned to one of the skillgroups to which that staff member belongs. If a skillgroup is not selected during the assignment process, the default skillgroup for that staff member will be used.
Note that it is only possible to assign a job to a staff member only if their "Assign Job" status is set to "Yes".
A job can be assigned by selecting a staff member first, and then one of the skillgroups to which they belong
or, by selecting a skillgroup first and then one of the staff members belonging to that skillgroup
Assigning a helpdesk job directly to a skillgroup is a way of "pooling" helpdesk jobs in a common job queue. These jobs can then be reassigned to the appropriate staff member within that skillgroup.
If a helpdesk job is assigned to a skillgroup, it will appear in 2 different places within the Helpdesk Explorer. Firstly, it will appear in the "Unassigned Jobs" queue for the skillgroup that is it assigned to within the "Skillgroups" panel of the Helpdesk Explorer. It will also appear within the "Unassigned - skillgroup" queue for each staff member that is associated with that skillgroup.
If a job is assigned to a skillgroup, the only action that can be performed on it is another re-assign action. This reassignment may be to another skillgroup, or to a helpdesk staff member. Only once a helpdesk job is actually assigned to a person and not a skillgroup, can it have the full range of actions performed on it.
See also