New Manager’s Guide: Support Audit in 90 Days

Starting a new role in support operations leadership can feel like stepping onto a moving train. You’re expected to improve customer satisfaction, increase team efficiency, and chart a long-term strategy—all at once.

But making meaningful progress in just 90 days takes more than ambition. You need a focused plan and a structured audit to understand what’s working, what’s broken, and where to act first.

This guide gives you a practical roadmap and detailed checklist to assess, adjust, and advance your support operation—starting from day one.

Why do an audit in the first 90 days?

Conducting an audit during your first 90 days gives you a structured view of what’s working—and what’s holding the team back. It helps you evaluate systems, processes, staffing, and performance metrics while aligning your support operation with broader company goals.

More importantly, it allows you to spot “quick wins”—small but high-impact fixes that build early momentum and trust. These early gains give your team a lift and signal competence to stakeholders.

In support environments, where issues like ticket backlog, SLA compliance, and agent burnout can pile up quickly, a well-run audit sets the tone for sustainable improvement. It moves you from reaction to direction—starting on day one.

The 90‑Day Audit Roadmap

Your first three months as a support operations manager are critical. This roadmap breaks that window into three practical phases: Assess, Adjust, and Advance—each with specific audit checkpoints to help you stabilize and elevate your team.

Days 1–30: Assess – Ground Yourself in the Operation

Use this time to understand systems, team dynamics, and existing workflows. You can read about workflow automation in Supportbench.

1. Plan Your Audit

Identify core areas: tools, processes, metrics, staffing, and quality control. Use a risk-based approach to set priorities.

2. Review Tools and Systems

Audit your helpdesk, CRM, chat, phone, and analytics tools. Check for outdated features, missing automations, or inactive subscriptions.

3. Map Workflows

Trace the full ticket lifecycle—from intake to resolution. Talk to frontline agents to surface friction points and manual workarounds.

4. Analyze Metrics

Review KPIs like FRT, FCR, CSAT, NPS, backlog size, and SLA compliance. Check if dashboards focus on what matters and align with business goals.

5. Talk to Key Stakeholders

Clarify goals with your manager (e.g., stability vs. CX). Interview cross-functional teams and frontline agents for operational blind spots.

6. Audit Support Quality

Sample tickets from different channels. Look for tone, clarity, empathy, and adherence to the knowledge base. Shadow live interactions weekly.

7. Inventory Team Skills

Map team roles. Note strengths and gaps—especially in areas like automation, documentation, and reporting.

Goal for Days 1–30: Deliver a clear diagnostic report outlining what’s working, where the pain points lie, and which quick wins to prioritize.

Days 31–60: Adjust – Move From Diagnosis to Action

With your diagnostic complete, the next 30 days are about making tangible improvements. Focus on refining systems, eliminating bottlenecks, and setting up processes that can support scale.

1. Align Tools and Automate Efficiently

Clean up outdated macros, remove duplicate tools, and streamline automations to prevent ticket misrouting. Start documenting systems so they’re easier to maintain and onboard against.

2. Improve Data and Reporting

Fix tagging and categorization errors that affect your metrics. Strengthen SLA visibility with real-time dashboards that help both leadership and agents act on insights, not assumptions.

3. Fill Critical Staffing or Skill Gaps

Deploy team members into clearly defined roles—such as quality assurance or knowledge base ownership—and launch focused training in tool usage, documentation, and data handling.

4. Standardize Processes

Update standard operating procedures (SOPs) for ticket routing, escalation, and closure. Consolidate learnings from your audit into a shared playbook that aligns the team around best practices.

5. Revamp Customer and Agent Feedback

Set up structured ways to gather insights—through regular surveys or interviews—and share that feedback back with the team. This builds morale and informs adjustments that matter.

6. Launch Quick‑Win Initiatives

Act on the most urgent and high-impact findings from your audit—such as clearing backlogs or reducing slow response times. Track improvements and highlight early wins with stakeholders.

Goal for Days 31–60: Show meaningful early progress. Reduce friction, upgrade workflows, and introduce systems that lay the groundwork for sustainable improvement.

Days 61–90: Advance – Cement Improvements and Drive Long‑Term Change

With the foundation in place, your final 30 days should focus on embedding changes, scaling improvements, and aligning your support ops with broader business goals.

1. Scale Results and Foster Sustainable Growth

Extend successful automations and process optimizations across the entire operation. Hold workshops to reinforce improved workflows and clarify ownership.

2. Boost Process Maturity

Introduce QA frameworks with scoring systems. Run peer reviews and start coaching sessions to foster skill development. Track ongoing improvements via a shared feedback board.

3. Embed a Data‑Driven Culture

Run recurring KPI reviews with leadership. Assign clear metric ownership—CSAT to agents, FCR to team leads, backlog to ops—to drive accountability.

4. Establish a Feedback and Training Loop

Nominate team champions to maintain documentation and onboard new hires. Create a rhythm for reviewing metrics, agent well-being, and CX performance on a monthly or quarterly basis.

5. Link Support Operations to Strategic Goals

Connect improvements to wider company targets like retention, revenue, or cost control. Show how operational wins (e.g., better FCR or CSAT) directly contribute to these priorities.

6. Celebrate Success and Set Direction

Host a milestone review to recognize team contributions and share progress. Use this moment to announce “Phase 1 Complete” and lay out plans and resources needed for the next phase.

Goal for Days 61–90: Lock in progress. Create habits, reinforce feedback systems, and position support operations as a scalable, strategic contributor to company success.

Core Components of the 90‑Day Audit Checklist

This summary table outlines what to focus on in each audit phase. Use it as a quick reference to guide your planning and progress.

Tips for Making Your Audit Succeed

Audits aren’t just about checklists—they’re about making smart changes that last. These tips will help you navigate the process effectively.

1.Stay Structured but Agile

Use the 30‑60‑90 framework as your guide, but stay flexible. If unexpected issues come up, adapt your timeline and priorities accordingly.

2.Engage the Team Early

Involve agents from the start. Ask what slows them down and which tools they avoid or rely on. Their insights will ground your audit in day-to-day realities.

3.Set Clear Priorities

Don’t try to fix everything at once. Focus on changes that have both high impact and can realistically be implemented within 90 days.

4.Communicate Often

Transparency builds trust. Share weekly updates with your team and stakeholders—even small progress builds momentum and confidence.

5. Measure Everything

Data proves value. Track key KPIs like CSAT, FCR, and response time before and after your changes to show tangible results.

6. Build for Scale

Design solutions that will hold up as your team grows. Avoid one-off patches in favour of scalable systems and repeatable processes.

Case Study: PMO Turnaround in 90 Days

A mid-sized enterprise generating $2.5 billion in annual revenue faced a critical tipping point. Its Project Management Office (PMO) had lost trust, was seen as ineffective, and leadership issued an ultimatum: deliver results within 90 days—or shut it down.

The Challenge

The PMO had become bloated with low-value projects, fragmented processes, and overworked managers. Key teams were bypassing it entirely, citing bureaucracy and poor delivery.

The Solution

A rapid audit led to the closure of 12 underperforming projects. Governance was simplified, dashboards introduced real-time visibility, and a concise project playbook replaced bloated documentation. One stalled, high-profile project was successfully delivered within 14 days to restore credibility.

To sustain the turnaround, the team launched a “listening tour” with stakeholders, introduced coaching for PMs, and reframed the PMO as a delivery enabler rather than a compliance enforcer.

The Outcome

Within 90 days:

• On-time delivery improved by 83%
• Executive satisfaction rose 42%
• Active project load dropped by 31%

The PMO was no longer optional—it became a strategic partner with renewed budget and executive access. Success came not from templates, but from clarity, agility, and bold early wins.1

Note: This case was shared by Daniel Hemhauser, a top LinkedIn voice in Project Management, based on a real transformation initiative in the U.S.

Common Pitfalls & How to Avoid Them

Even well-planned audits can stumble. Here are five common mistakes new managers make—and how to avoid them:

1. Cramming Too Much Into Phase 1: Don’t try to solve everything in the first 30 days. Focus on clarity and actionable insights—not perfection.
2. Neglecting the Team’s Voice: Agents know what’s broken. If you skip their input, your fixes won’t last.
3. Solving Symptoms, Not Root Causes: Don’t just chase SLA numbers. Address the process gaps and tool limitations behind the metrics.
4. Skipping Stakeholder Alignment: If you don’t align with leadership and cross-functional teams early, your changes may face resistance down the road.
5. Focusing Only on Metrics: CSAT scores mean little if agents are burning out. Balance quantitative goals with team well-being and sustainability.

In Closing

A structured 90-day audit sets the stage for lasting operational success. By assessing systems, processes, people, and culture, new managers can generate early wins and define a long-term strategy that sticks.

But it’s more than ticking boxes—it’s a change management process. To succeed, you need the right tools that support visibility, accountability, and scalable impact.

Supportbench helps power this transformation by giving support leaders what they need to track performance, manage SLAs, streamline workflows, and align operations with strategic goals.

With the right platform, your Assess → Adjust → Advance roadmap becomes more than a plan. It becomes a proven path to measurable results.