Help Desk Specialist

Important Notice for Applicants:
At Bixal, we want to ensure a transparent and secure application process for all candidates. Official communication will come from an email address ending in @bixal.com or from @bixal.na.teamtailor-mail.com. Messages from other sources may be fraudulent, and you should exercise care to avoid any links or attachments included.

Bixal will ensure that individuals with disabilities are provided reasonable accommodation to participate in the job application or interview process, to perform essential job functions, and to receive other benefits and privileges of employment.

Need Assistance or a Reasonable Accommodation?
If you need assistance or a reasonable accommodation to complete your application, we're here to help. Please reach out to us at [email protected] and let us know how we can support you. You do not need to share personal details or disclose the nature of your request.  You can expect a response from a team member within 24 hours during the regular work week and on the next operating day during the weekend or holidays.

Why Bixal?

Bixal is a consulting company headquartered in Fairfax, VA, working alongside governments and organizations to help them deliver better services and experiences to the communities they serve. Using evidence-based knowledge and technology, Bixal empowers clients to deliver on their missions more effectively by fostering a culture of learning and continuous improvement.

Our values:

• People-First: Emphasizing the importance of people in all aspects of work.

• Collaboration and Transparency: Valuing teamwork and open communication.

• Growth Mindset: Encouraging innovation and continuous improvement.

• Creating Lasting Impact: Focusing on meaningful outcomes and positive change.

About the role:

Bixal is seeking a Help Desk Specialist to be the first point of contact for users of a federal platform that supports governmentwide regulatory planning and review. Federal agencies, oversight offices, and the public rely on these systems, which must stay available 24/7/365 while a modern replacement is built alongside them.

You will provide both Tier 1 and Tier 2 support, diagnosing and resolving issues directly, from access and account problems to errors inside complex, role-based regulatory workflows, and escalating to engineering only when a fix requires a code or infrastructure change. You will also be the team's early-warning system: spotting patterns in tickets that point to defects, escalating outages immediately, and feeding what users experience back to the engineering team. As new capabilities are released on the modernized platform, you will support users through each change, so we're looking for an experienced support professional who can work independently across both a legacy system and a new one.

This role is technical and service-oriented. You will work closely with our engineers, trainers, and change enablement lead, and with client stakeholders who depend on fast, accurate support.

This is a full-time position on an awarded contract with a 12-month base period and two 12-month option periods. This role offers you a unique opportunity to make a meaningful impact on a project that aligns with Bixal’s mission of delivering innovative, human-centered solutions. While the role has a fixed duration, we are committed to transparency and collaboration, keeping you informed about contract updates and new opportunities. At Bixal, we support your professional journey, ensuring your experience reflects our inclusive, purpose-driven culture and prepares you for future success.

Location

This role can work remotely from anywhere in the USA. You must be legally authorized to work in the US.  Bixal does not provide visa sponsorship. 

Compensation:

The salary range for this role is $90,000 – $110,000. In the spirit of transparency, most offers tend to land near the midpoint of the range. We make compensation decisions thoughtfully, considering your experience, the skills you bring, and our commitment to internal equity. Fairness and transparency are core to how we operate.

Responsibilities:

User Support & Issue Resolution

• Serve as the first point of contact for agency and oversight office users by web, phone, and email, providing Tier 1 and Tier 2 support and resolving technical, access, account, and process issues directly whenever possible.

• Triage, categorize, and log every incident and service request in Zendesk, including requestor, description, time logged, and time to resolve.

• Meet contractual service levels: an initial tailored response to 95% of tickets within 3 business hours, and resolution or escalation of 98% within 1 business day.

• Handle user access and authorization requests, login issues, and questions about workflows, roles, and system status.

• Investigate complex issues using application logs, database queries, and system monitoring tools, and escalate those that need engineering support with clear reproduction steps, root-cause findings, and user impact.

Monitoring, Escalation & Reporting

• Monitor incoming tickets for patterns that suggest widespread issues or defects, and flag systemic problems to the engineering team.

• Report outages and serious issues immediately to the technical team by phone and email, especially those affecting public availability, system performance, or data integrity.

• Produce weekly and ad hoc help desk reports covering ticket volume, response and resolution times by priority, and trends.

• Feed recurring user pain points into the product backlog as inputs for future fixes and enhancements.

User Enablement & Release Support

• Create and update targeted help content, including online tips, FAQs, and user guide updates.

• Support training materials and workshops in partnership with the training and change enablement leads.

• Support users through each new release on the modernized platform, answering questions and capturing early feedback.

• Help maintain help desk procedures, ticket categories, and knowledge base content as systems change.

• Other relevant duties as assigned and qualified/trained to perform.

Qualifications:

• Bachelor's degree in Information Technology, Computer Science, Information Systems, or a related field.

• At least 4 years of experience providing Tier 1 and Tier 2 technical support for enterprise-level web applications, including complex, workflow-driven or role-based systems.

• Demonstrated experience resolving issues independently through Tier 2 troubleshooting, and knowing when and how to escalate to engineering teams.

• Hands-on experience with Zendesk or a comparable ticketing system (such as ServiceNow or Jira Service Management), including ticket categorization, workflow configuration, and reporting.

• Experience consistently meeting defined service-level agreements for response and resolution times.

• Working knowledge of SQL and application log analysis to investigate and diagnose user-reported issues.

• Strong troubleshooting skills across user access and permissions, browser, application, and integration issues, with the ability to document root causes and reproduction steps for engineers.

• Experience analyzing support data to identify trends and systemic defects, and turning findings into clear reports and recommendations.

• Experience writing user-facing help content, FAQs, or knowledge base articles.

• Excellent written and verbal communication skills, with a patient, professional approach to supporting users of varied technical backgrounds, including senior government stakeholders.

• This position requires the ability to obtain and maintain a favorable Public Trust determination in support of a federal government contract.

Nice to Have Skills and Experience:

• ITIL Foundation or CompTIA A+ certification.

• Experience supporting federal agency users or a federal help desk.

• Familiarity with federal regulatory processes, such as rulemaking, the Unified Agenda, or Paperwork Reduction Act information collections.

• Experience supporting applications built on Java and Oracle, or similar enterprise technology stacks.

• Experience supporting users through a system migration or the rollout of a new platform.

• Familiarity with accessibility standards (Section 508, WCAG) for user-facing content.
  

How We Support Our Team:

• Flex hours

• 401K with matching incentive

• Parental Leave

• Medical/dental/vision benefits

• Flex Spending Account

• Company provided short-term disability and life insurance

• Commuter benefits

• Paid Time Off (PTO)

• 11 Paid holidays

Our company is committed to providing equal employment opportunities for all individuals and complies with all applicable federal, state, and local anti-discrimination laws. Employment decisions are based on merit, qualifications, and business needs.