When a company shoves "fun place to work" it is usually because they over work you to begin with and here that is true. I often times see people either skip or not take their lunch or eat at their desks. For a corproate job 30 min lunches are a bit of a joke. I often felt chained to my desk working at the helpdesk. There was always too much to do with too little people. Co workers were very helpful but can tell they had the "what do you want now" look on their face because they had little time to teach you how to do something without having a bunch of phone calls to tend to. I was very very micro managed so the point I was asking myself constantly "why are they asking me details about every little thiing I do or don't do". I personally felt there was little to no room for mistakes, as when I made one regardless of how small, I later would have three emails from different supervisors, a follow up meeting and a touch base for every mistake (can anyone say officespace movie?). Office is cramped and they moved the helpdesk to rediculous "workbench" style seats where you have absolutely no privacy at all. Very picky about everything because their contracts with customers are month to month and not yearly etc. great learning opportunity but came at a rush to get something done. I found myself never having the time to learn a customer very well because I had to "move onto the next call/ticket" almost immediately. I like goals to get certifications, but one every six months is not sitting well eith me. I barely have time at work you think I want to spend all my free time studying to get a pass on an exam every six months? Nah...
Some helpdesk functions were definitely more of a systems engineer or systems admin type of duties, NOT a helpdesk dutie (tape backups, dns and dhcp). They give you an engineer test at your interview, tell you it means nothinng. I feel like it does actually because most stuff on that test had zero to do with helpdesk. They gave me an engineer test because that is what I was doing in my job lol.
The hiring pricess is like you will never see, and it is because they want good people. It makes me wonder though.