What are the Usual Roles and Responsibilities of a Tech Support Specialist?

If you take a look at the job description of any professional IT specialist, you will see this, or something similar to this:

“Problem solver and problem solving scalability, able to present technical information, processing improvement, software maintenance, software testing, network design and implementation, good customer relationship, software performance tuning, network performance tuning, database performance tuning, hardware analysis and repair.”

This about sums up what the roles and responsibilities of a tech support professional are. Basically, the tech support specialist is there to fix your computer when it breaks down.

General Roles and Responsibilities

TI support specialists provide technical support, advice, and assistance to customers and businesses with technical, hardware, and software system problems, be it a customer with a single PC at home or a business with several PC’s and laptops. Specialists generally deal directly with customers and must effectively communicate answers in a way that the customers can understand. The most common problem technical support specialists have to face are connection problems, inabilities to access data, slow performance, inefficient programs, and to replace deficient hardware. Some specialists may work on site to modify, install, clean, and repair computer software and hardware.

Customer Service

Part of the customer service of technical support specialists is to answer inquiries from computer users. They may run diagnostic programs to determine the causes of and help resolve problems. Additional job duties may include writing training manuals, training users, and overseeing computer information systems. Resolving issues with Local Area Networks (LAN), Wide Area Networks (WAN), and other systems is frequently done together with the computer users or business.

Technical support specialists respond to inquiries by telephone, e-mail, live chat, or other means. Typically, they are required to listen to the customer’s problem, diagnose the nature of the issue and walk the caller through the steps required to solve it. They may assist with installing software, maintaining computer systems, and repairing computer hardware. When all else fails, they are then required to go on site and fix the problem, especially if the problem is hardware in nature. In some cases, the customer may bring their PC to the tech support specialist.

Educational Background

While respect is never demanded by professional tech support specialists, they do deserve their fair share of respect, not just because of the demand of the job, but also because of their educational background. The majority of professional IT specialists hold a bachelor’s degree in computer science, information technology, or computer engineering. Some specialize in computer information systems. A small portion are graduates of 1-year or 2-year computer systems courses.

This is understandable considering that employers need to hire only the best people as professional tech support specialists. Many tech support companies have their own training regimen for newly-hired employees so as to find out what skills the newbies really have while adjusting to the environment of a new company.

The next time you call for a professional tech support specialist, keep in mind that the person helping you to fix your computer problems on the other end isn’t just called “professional” for nothing.


By: Supportrix - Providing full spectrum technical support