Nah! That's way too much of your life wasted. As for the main question. If you plan to be programming or building systems, then 6-12 months on the help-desk

Nah! That's way too much of your life wasted. As for the main question. If you plan to be programming or building systems, then 6-12 months on the help-desk will make you so much more aware of the sorts of things that are show stoppers for average users. In my experience technical staff with help-desk experience make better usability decisions.