Making volume meaningful.
WHY IT MATTERS
Without categories, you know how many tickets you had and nothing else.
WHAT CATEGORIES SHOULD REFLECT
What the customer was trying to do, and what went wrong.
WHAT TO AVOID
Categories only staff understand Too many to choose from quickly A general category that absorbs everything
WHY THAT LAST ONE MATTERS
It becomes the largest category and tells you nothing.
HOW MANY TO HAVE
Few enough that categorisation is quick and consistent.
WHAT TO ADD BEYOND CATEGORY
Whether it was a fault, a question, or a request.
WHY THAT DISTINCTION
Faults indicate product problems; questions indicate documentation problems; requests indicate roadmap input.
WHAT TO REVIEW MONTHLY
Volume by category, and its direction.
WHAT RISING CATEGORIES INDICATE
Something changed.
WHAT TO DO ABOUT THE LARGEST
Fix the cause.
WHY THAT IS THE POINT
Categorisation exists to direct improvement, not to produce reports.
WHAT TO CHECK
Whether categories are applied consistently.
HOW
Sample tickets and compare.
WHAT TO DO WHEN THEY ARE NOT
Simplify them.
WHAT TO RETIRE
Categories nobody uses.
