Process and procedures can be rigid and restrictive.  Humans tend to slack after a while because over time, no incidents have happened even though they slacked.  Take my case for example; over a period of time, signature in forms are no longer verified because all the while, the requests that came into Service Desk are genuine, or rather, assumed to be genuine.  Just because no incidents has occurred, it does not mean that something has not happened; it also does not mean that nothing is ever going to happen.

Being complacent is just so dangerous.  If one of your team members start to develop a lackadaisical attitude, it will spread to the rest of the team in no time.  Trust me, I’ve been there and it takes a huge effort to change that habit.  As the famous saying goes, Prevention is Better Than Cure, rings true in Service Desk too.  Once in a while, on an ad hoc basis, you have to press that Test button to check the quality of your team’s work.  To add on a weightage to your new ad hoc quality checks, build this into your team’s Key Performance Indicators so that they know you mean business.

Knowing that you will spring surprises on them, your team members will be constantly on their toes; bringing about a slight increase in work pressure, which can be reduced through appropriate rewards.