Centralized Knowledge Portal Streamlines Technical Support to Save Time and Money.
By now, most tech companies have call centers where the customer, prompted by a recording,
keys in a number that most closely relates to their problem. Massachusetts-based Kronos Inc.,
which provides payroll and labor management software applications to more than 40,000
customers worldwide, is taking it one step further. With the help of Cleveland-based
Digibahn, Kronos implemented a database where the firm's 1,600 technical support experts and
engineers can access more than a million technical questions, cases, and articles that the
firm has compiled over several years in one centralized intranet location.
"Previously, all of these data sources were insulated from each other in the company,"
says Kronos' John Penaloza. "Now we can take a common syntax of search terminology…and
search inside these insulated applications and come up with results that can directly relate
apples to apples."
The database system, called Autonomy, will not only record a history of every technical
question, it will track which issues Kronos technical support staff have accessed the most.
So far, the database has been rolled out only for internal technical support, but Kronos and
Digibahn are working a similar system that will be available to customers.
"This is shaving at least 5 minutes off our technical calls," says Kronos Director
of Service Operations Mark Ellis. "and that's just the tip of the ice berg."
