Before implementing any new system or a change, it is impotent to understand that unless everyone is convinced and are part of it, the change would never be successful.

Necessity+Vision+Plan+Resources+Competence  = Change

Necessity+Vision+Plan+Resources+Competence = Resistance

Necessity+Vision+Plan+Resources+Competence = Confusion

Necessity+Vision+Plan+Resources+Competence = Chaos

Necessity+Vision+Plan+Resources+Competence = Frustration

Necessity+Vision+Plan+Resources+Competence = Fear

Recommendations for Implementation

1. It’s a marathon not a sprint; road-maps and workshops are helpful. While implementation takes on various forms from ongoing improvements to long-term projects, IT leaders, as a whole, noted an evolutionary mentality. Having a road-map for the direction of the IT organization was seen as particularly effective by demonstrating the achievements of long-term goals, and directing future decisions. 
2. Don’t underestimate the value of a good sales job. Effectively communicating the business value of process improvement optimization to the business was noted as a key to the success of many enterprises service management improvement projects. Selling improvements such as cost reduction or service improvements were both noted. Where IT was perceived as a maintenance organization cost-reduction seemed to be the greater selling point. 
3. Build IT credibility. Rather than reinventing IT, directors and CIOs were able to leverage the existing perception of IT, as a maintenance organization, as strength. If IT can succeed in the core activities which the business has come to expect of them, i.e. keeping the lights on, they can build goodwill and credibility with the business. Credibility makes the sales job easier when it comes time to gain support for process improvements which may not be perceived as mission critical to executives. 
4. Moving IT to a business-centric. IT delivery model is a process that continues to challenge small and midsized enterprises. Gauge the enterprise’s current ITSM maturity by learning why and how other small and midsize enterprises are moving to become service oriented.

ISO/IEC 20000 Standard for ITSM

ISO (the International Organization for Standardization) and IEC (The International Electrotechnical Commission) form the specialized system for worldwide standardization. National bodies that are members of ISO or IEC participate in the development of International Standards through technical committees established by the respective organization to deal with particular fields of technical activity. ISO and IEC technical committees collaborate in fields of mutual interest. Other international organizations, governmental and non-governmental, in liaison with ISO and IEC, also take part in the work. In the field of information technology, ISO and IEC have established a joint technical committee, ISO/IEC JTC 1. International Standards are drafted in accordance with the rules given in the ISO/IEC Directives, Part 2. The main task of the joint technical committee is to prepare International Standards. Draft International Standards adopted by the joint technical committee are circulated to national bodies for voting. Publication as an International Standard requires approval by at least 75 % of the national bodies casting a vote. Attention is drawn to the possibility that some of the elements of this document may be the subject of patent rights. ISO and IEC shall not be held responsible for identifying any or all such patent rights. ISO/IEC 20000-1 was prepared by BSI (as BS 15000-1) and was adopted, under a special “fast-track procedure”, by Joint Technical Committee ISO/IEC JTC 1, Information technology, in parallel with its approval by national bodies of ISO and IEC.

ISO/IEC 20000 consists of the following parts, under the general title Information technology Service Management:

Part 1: Specification

Part 2: Code of practice

This part of ISO/IEC 20000 promotes the adoption of an integrated process approach to effectively deliver managed services to meet the business and customer requirements. For an  organization to function effectively it has to identify and manage numerous linked activities. An activity using resources, and managed in order to enable the transformation of inputs into outputs, can be considered as a process. Often the output from one process forms an input to another. Coordinated integration and implementation of the service management processes provides the ongoing control, greater efficiency and opportunities for continual improvement. Performing the activities and processes requires people in the service desk, service support, service delivery and operations teams to be well organized and coordinated. Appropriate tools are also required to ensure that the processes are effective and efficient. It is assumed that the execution of the provisions of this part of ISO/IEC 20000 is entrusted to appropriately qualified and competent people. An International Standard does not purport to include all necessary provisions of a contract. Users of International Standards are responsible for their correct application. Compliance with an International Standard does not of itself confer immunity from legal obligations.

ITSM Implementation – Typical guideline

A typical high level overview of an ITSM implementation structure encompasses the following:

1.    Determine the current, existing IT infrastructure, processes, and services

2.    Develop some desired future state of IT and the services that it needs to provide

3.    Architect a "roadmap" that depicts how to get to the desired state from the current state

4.    Determine the steps needed to execute the "roadmap"

 

The ITSM implementation framework for each of the IT Service Delivery and Service Support areas listed above is a 5 phase model:

• Assessment - determine the current state and begin to collect and understand the metrics for the future desired state
• Architect and Design - develop a mature design for the future desired state
• Planning - develop those plans necessary to achieve the future desired state in a phased evolutionary fashion
• Implementation - implement and deploy the plans within IT and across the enterprise to achieve the future desired state
• Support - manage, maintain, and improve the future desired state being able to adaptively integrate enhancements as needed or required

Within this framework, effectively managing IT as an enterprise wide, service oriented entity typically comprises one or more of the following separate and distinct perspectives:

• People - quantity and quality of expertise and knowledge
• Process - IT and organization specific practices, procedures, guidelines, etc. and the level of complexity and sophistication of them
• Technology - total logical and physical technology infrastructure consisting of hardware, software, communication networks, applications, DBMS, etc.
• Organization - internal and external business factors that affect IT, how IT and the organization interface, what is the organizations "corporate culture", what are the organization's direction and how does that affect IT
• Integration - how is IT integrated within the business model, what services does IT provide, how are the services provided, and how are best practices employed within IT

One primary origin of ITSM can be found in the systems management services and functions historically done in large scale mainframe environments. Through constant refinement over the years these services and functions attained a high level of maturity. Problem and change management, configuration management, capacity planning, performance management, disaster recovery, availability management, etc. are some examples. When examining the differences between mainframe systems management services and ITSM, it becomes apparent that when ITSM is applied in today's IT environment and across the enterprise the benefits and sophistication of its best practices are highlighted and exemplified. Where mainframe environments are typically centralized, ITSM is applicable to both distributed and centralized environments. In addition, where mainframe services are typically stand-alone and technology based, ITSM provides for integrated services that are process based with a focus on satisfying business requirements. Although managing the technology itself is a necessary component of most ITSM solutions, it is not a primary focus. Instead ITSM addresses the need to align the delivery of IT services closely with the needs of the business. This transformation of a traditional "business - IT paradigm" can be depicted by some of the following attributes:

Traditional I/T becomes ITSM Process Technology focus è Process focus "Fire-fighting" è Preventative Reactive è Proactive Users è Customers Centralized, done in-house è Distributed, sourced Isolated, silos è Integrated, enterprise-wide "One off", adhoc è Repeatable, accountable Informal processes è Formal best practices IT internal perspective è Business perspective Operational specific è Service orientation
Business objectives, service level objectives, technology infrastructure and other areas play critical roles in any ITSM method paradigm and are presented and discussed in detail in ITSM Services.
Critical Success Factors Communication, communication, communication Leveraging on Practitioners and consultants Project Management Driven from top-management Involve your own employees (supported by consultant) Reporting about KPI’s (show what you have done) Phased approach How does ITIL help? Return On Investment – an example For IT 30% reduction in incident volume 50% reduction in resolution time 25% reduction in resolution cost Business 10% increase in service availability Reduction in Time-to-Market 25% improvement in project cycle time (for changes) 50% reduction in volume of expensive emergency changes Total customer satisfaction increase on end-to-end IT services Financial 10% reduction in TCO 5% reduction in overcapacity And many more ………..
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Author - Vijayakumar Reddy, CTO & Lead Trainer, A2A IMTCS Pvt. LTD.
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