Dell places strong emphasis on recruiting and training technical support staff to ensure quality customer service. The company seeks candidates with technical skills, communication abilities, and a customer-centric mindset. Dell uses a thorough interview process and competency-based questions to evaluate fits. New hires undergo 12 weeks of training covering various technical, cultural, and language skills before handling customer calls. This extensive recruitment and preparation aims to provide superior support to Dell's globally diverse customer base.

1. Human Resource Management International Digest
Dell’s technical-support staff have the power to do more: Recruitment and training ensure quality
customer service
Teena Bagga Geetanjali Khanna
Article information:
To cite this document:
Teena Bagga Geetanjali Khanna , (2014),"Dell’s technical-support staff have the power to do more", Human Resource
Management International Digest, Vol. 22 Iss 6 pp. 7 - 9
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2. Dell’s technical-support staff have the
power to do more
Recruitment and training ensure quality customer service
Teena Bagga and Geetanjali Khanna
Teena Bagga is an
Assistant Professor
based at Amity Business
School, Amity University
Uttar Pradesh, Noida,
India. Geetanjali Khanna
is based at Amity
Business School, Amity
University, Noida, India.
A
n important reason for the success of computer giant Dell is product customization –
the process of tailoring each product to the needs of a specific customer. This
demands technical staff who are capable of interpreting each client’s needs and
providing a product to match. And that, in turn, calls for employees chosen for their
empathy and trained in the required hard and soft skills.
Among the tasks that technical-support staff frequently have to perform are resetting
passwords and setting up printers, as well as diagnosing and correcting computer
faults.
The types of employee that the company seeks
Dell’s talent-acquisition team has an elaborate and exhaustive checklist for hiring the
technical-support associates who help customers around the globe. They include:
 Tech savvy: Technical-support associates should understand the latest technology
trends and have good insight into Dell’s products and the requirements of each
customer. They should be equally at ease dealing with clients with a detailed
knowledge of information technology and those who have almost none.
 Positive attitude: Technical-support associates must be able to understand different
cultures and backgrounds and find a way out of any problem. A positive attitude is a big
help in achieving this.
 Excellent communication skills: Technical-support associates with good communication
skills leave a better impression on clients. This, in turn, improves the company
image. Employees who do not understand the customer’s requirements correctly
could customize computers incorrectly, and so result in dissatisfied customers. A
person who can speak several languages is usually preferred over someone who
can speak only one.
 Organizational loyalty: Employees should be committed to Dell and its products and
prepared to stay with the company for the long term. This reduces the recruitment
and training costs associated with appointing a new employee. It also enables
employees to build up knowledge about the company and its products.
 Customer-centric and empathetic: Technical-support staff will usually make a better
job of customizing a computer if they understand a customer’s needs and can guide
him or her in the right direction.
DOI 10.1108/HRMID-08-2014-0112 VOL. 22 NO. 6 2014, pp. 7-9, © Emerald Group Publishing Limited, ISSN 0967-0734 HUMAN RESOURCE MANAGEMENT INTERNATIONAL DIGEST PAGE 7
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3.  Patient: Technical-support calls tend to be quite long. They sometimes involve
customers who are ill at ease with computer concepts and jargon. For these
reasons, technical-support staff need to be patient.
 Adaptable: Each customer call is different. A good customer-service representative
is able to adapt to changes in customer situations and behavior during the call.
Customers can sometimes switch topics or introduce new information without
warning. Customer-service associates need to be able to adapt to these changes.
 Good listener: A good customer-service associate should listen carefully to the
client to get the best possible picture of his or her needs.
The company summarizes these competencies as:
 Engage: Always act with the customer in mind. Listen, take ownership, be a role model,
grow and learn. Provide direction, development and inspiration for others.
 Execute: Think globally, value diversity, collaborate and consider the impact. Be
courageous, contribute, provide/solicit input and take action. Focus on what matters
most, streamline workflows and strive to be effective.
 Excel: Drive strategy. Know the business. Look ahead and plan for the future. Be
creative, take smart risks and continuously improve.
Sources of candidates
Dell relies heavily on the following for hiring customer-support staff:
 vendor partners;
 campus hiring;
 walk-ins;
 employee referrals; and
 LinkedIn and other job portals, although only for senior positions.
The company tends to prefer graduates in business administration, commerce, computer
applications or technology. These people tend to be better prepared for Dell’s own
technical training than more generalist arts or science graduates. They also tend to stay
with the company longer. The firm tends to avoid recruiting postgraduate students for
technical-support roles, as they generally do not settle well into a career of offering advice
to the public over the telephone.
The company favors people with at least three years of technical experience and a year of
experience in customer care, who are good team-workers and who can adapt easily to
round-the-clock shift patterns.
Competency-based philosophy
Dell believes that a candidate’s recent experience is the best indicator of future success.
The company designs its interviews as a conversation, focusing on the candidate’s
experience and how it relates to the vacancy.
The firm tends to avoid recruiting postgraduate students for
technical-support roles, as they generally do not settle well
into a career of offering advice to the public over the
telephone.
PAGE 8 HUMAN RESOURCE MANAGEMENT INTERNATIONAL DIGEST VOL. 22 NO. 6 2014
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4. The company’s competency-based interview questions are designed to elicit details about
the work the candidate has done, the way he or she has completed that work and the
environment in which he or she worked.
Step 1 involves telephone screening conducted by a recruiter, who attempts to gather
basic information such as work history and salary requirements.
The second step is a technical/functional interview with a subject-matter expert, to
determine the applicant’s technical/functional expertise.
This is followed by an on-site/team interview with leaders and peers in a panel-interview
setting. At this stage, Dell asks competency-based questions to measure the candidate’s
overall fit with the team and company.
The final interview is conducted by the hiring manager or director. This also includes
competency-based interview questions and ensures that all candidate questions are
answered.
The company says that candidates can expect a realistic preview of the job and the
interview process; to ask any question and have it be answered with transparency and
candor; to be fairly considered for opportunities where qualifications meet requirements;
post-interview communication on the next steps within seven days; the best possible job
offer the first time; to be treated as a valued customer of Dell products and solutions; and
integrity and respect.
New employees get 12 weeks of training
Newly recruited employees received 12 weeks of training before being allowed to field
customer calls. The training covers:
 National cultures: with particular emphasis on US culture;
 Voice and accent: to ensure that trainees can be heard and understood by a wide
range of clients from across the world; and
 Technical matters: paying particular attention to the diagnostic tools that Dell has
developed to help technical-support associates to troubleshoot customer problems.
Most time, during the 12-week training, is devoted to this.
The company focuses thereafter on informal development, including regular 360-degree
feedback, individual development plans, mentoring/networking and stretch assignments. It
fills around 40 per cent of vacancies internally.
Corresponding author
Teena Bagga can be contacted at: tbagga@amity.edu
To purchase reprints of this article please e-mail: reprints@emeraldinsight.com
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The company designs its interviews as a conversation,
focusing on the candidates experience and how it relates to
the vacancy.
Keywords:
Training,
Recruitment,
Computer industry,
Customer support,
Dell
VOL. 22 NO. 6 2014 HUMAN RESOURCE MANAGEMENT INTERNATIONAL DIGEST PAGE 9
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