ABSTRACT
The apparently diametrically opposed concepts of reactivity and proactivity are at the heart of organizing and managing the workload of the user support function. Reactivity is the tendency of the support team to deal with its workload by reacting to situations as they crop up; what the Oxford English Dictionary calls ‘acting or operating in return’. Proactivity is the state of anticipating the workload, relating to it and controlling it in a way that allows for innovation; a tendency to make things happen, as opposed to reactively dealing with them after they have already happened.
