Service revenues for both hardware and software companies have grown much faster than product revenues over the past decade. And not only have service revenues grown - overall margins have improved as well.

But this isn't just another short lived trend to be. In the most successful technology companies, support services are taking on an important new role. Innovative services executives are leading their organizations - and companies - into the future by delivering Value Added Services - those services that help companies sell more products, faster. For the technology industry, it's a watershed moment.

As a result, effectively developing and delivering quality Support Services has become a critical component for success. Today's technology companies are tasked with delivering increasingly complex and more advanced solutions to market, with greater support than ever before. A key driver of every successful Support Services operation is the ability to hire, onboard, and quickly make productive the people needed to deliver support services. The focus of this white paper is regarding a crucial yet often under-performing function called onboarding - the activities required to make an agent/analyst productive.