Support specialists work with end-users of software and systems to provide technical support and assistance for their software, hardware, or technical problems including connection, slow performance, inability to access data, or inefficient programs. They walk customers through software installation and launch newly-installed programs for the first time. They send technical documentation to customers and end-users and make recommendations to employees or customers for hardware changes if a computer cannot support a particularly needed software program.
Support specialists elevate difficult cases that they cannot resolve to support technicians or a senior analyst and sometimes remotely take over the control of a user's computer. They provide technical support to organizations by managing, maintaining, and troubleshooting their IT systems and communicate with co-workers to diagnose problems. They prioritize a workload to ensure the most critical issues are resolved first and document standard support procedures that co-workers may follow. Support specialists need a degree in computer science or information technology and program certification.