By order of firm management, the IT department is engaged in a major project to overhaul the "backroom" systems to bring greater stability and performance. IT would love to immerse its small band of engineers and sysadmins to tackle the project, but one problem is persistently thwarting them: those pesky users.

An attorney's hard drive failed. Someone can't print their mail merge document. A marketing assistant has a question about Excel. Don't these people realize there are bigger problems to be tackled and IT can't coddle them right now?

This is a trap some IT departments fall into, and quite frankly, they need to get over it. If they don't, they fail. Service is a long series of interruptions. IT departments are in the business of reacting, so they better get good at it. The face of the IT department is the help desk/support center. So if users feel they are being neglected, the reputation of IT will be blemished. The better IT is reacting to the needs of their users, preventing failures, and quickly resolving incidents due to unforeseen circumstances, they will have more time for projects.

In an upcoming blog post we will discuss some ways IT departments can improve their "reaction" time.