Month: June 2018

Lessons Learned from IT Service Management Tool Implementation: Part 6

Sixth in a Ten Part Series

By Chad Greenslade

I have often been asked about my lessons learned in implementing an IT Service Management (ITSM) tool. Below is the sixth in a ten part series examining my ITSM lessons learned.  I hope that these lessons help you on your journey to ITSM nirvana.

Lesson #6: Have Diligence Relative to Category, Sub-Category, and Item.  As I mentioned in Lesson #2, don’t take shortcuts or be short-sighted in the proper definition of your meta-data.  I realize that it may be impossible to know all the permutations that will ultimately exist for Category, Sub-Category, and Item when the ITSM platform is initially launched.  For this reason, you must make these fields not required for the user / customer, but required for the Service Desk prior to closing the service record.  The user will generally know if its hardware or software that is impacted, but they may not, or they may choose incorrectly.  Ultimately, it’s up to Service Operation to correctly append Category, Sub-Category, and Item to the service record and they must be empowered (authorized) to create new entries as needed in order to properly record the service record.

Lessons Learned from IT Service Management Tool Implementation: Part 5

Fifth in a Ten Part Series
By Chad Greenslade

I have often been asked about my lessons learned in implementing an IT Service Management (ITSM) tool.  Below is the fifth in a ten part series examining my ITSM lessons learned.  I hope that these lessons help you on your journey to ITSM nirvana.

Lesson #5: Have Service & Configuration Item (CI) Owners.  The concept here is simple; there is a single person listed in the ITSM platform that is responsible for the availability and working operation of the service and the configuration item.  When a new service record is logged against a service and a CI in the ITSM platform, the appropriate owners are automatically notified.  Similarly, if a request for change (RFC) is raised against a service or a CI, the ITSM platform knows to automatically append these persons as approvers of the RFC.

Lessons Learned from IT Service Management Tool Implementation: Part 4

Fourth in a Ten Part Series
By Chad Greenslade

I have often been asked about my lessons learned in implementing an IT Service Management (ITSM) tool.  Below is the fourth in a ten part series examining my ITSM lessons learned.  I hope that these lessons help you on your journey to ITSM nirvana.

Lesson #4: Log Incidents, Service Requests, Problems, Change, and Releases against Services AND Configuration Items.  As I’ve mentioned in the previous lessons, when a new service record comes into the Service Desk, you’ll want to ensure that accurate meta-data relative to the Service and Configuration Items impacted are accurately associated to the service record.  Now, it’s not necessary that the customer correctly identify the Service or Configuration Item, only that they submit as much information as they have to the Service Desk.  It’s the responsibility of Service Operations to ensure that the data ultimately appended to the service record is accurate.  Without the Service and Configuration Items being appended to the service record, it’s impossible to report on a variety of key performance indicators (KPIs) relative to the service and / or the configuration items.  For example, if a major incident record does not identify the service impacted, how can you accurately report on the availability of that service?  As I mentioned in point #3 above, if you make development of the Service Catalog prerequisite to launching your ITSM platform, logging the Service & CI impacted by the service record will be easy.  If you don’t, your ITSM platform will simply be just another “ticketing” application.

Lessons Learned from IT Service Management Tool Implementation: Part 3

By Chad Greenslade

I have often been asked about my lessons learned in implementing an IT Service Management (ITSM) tool.  Below is the third in a ten part series examining my ITSM lessons learned.  I hope that these lessons help you on your journey to ITSM nirvana.

Lesson #3: Have a Service Catalog.  The Service Catalog is the foundation of any ITIL-based IT environment.  If you don’t have a Service Catalog, then you don’t have true Service Management.  Developing a Service Catalog is not easy and its something that should be undertaken before any discussion of a potential ITSM tool should take place.

There is much literature relative to developing an IT Service Catalog, but a few key points to keep in mind are:
(a) It should be done in conjunction with the business (customers)
(b) It serves as the “menu” for what IT’s customers can order
(c) “Services” deliver business outcomes and are NOT applications or configuration items
(d) An IT organization’s assets (applications & configuration items) align to deliver services
(e) When a customer raises a request for service (an Incident, Problem, Service Request, Change, or Release), the “Service” that the customer is requesting assistance for, should be clearly identified.

Keep in mind that a customer doesn’t care that an application or network is down, they only care that their business outcome is not able to be achieved.  Having services defined in a catalog, and then reporting on the availability of them, is the true first step towards IT service management.