IT service management is crucial to guaranteeing a positive customer experience and dynamic growth.

As the use of IT gains momentum and reliance on systems becomes a necessity, the focus of IT management is shifting from component to service management. Historically, keeping systems healthy and running was the key goal indicator (KGI) of an IT service provider. However, aggressive business needs are driving a mindset change in this regard. As organisations focus on aligning their IT infrastructures to support service, IT service management is taking on greater significance.

Managing the IT infrastructure as a loosely interconnected group of components is no longer sufficient. Rather, the infrastructure must be managed from the viewpoint of the lines of business it supports.

Specifically, IT managers must have the processes and tools to ensure that the infrastructure keeps pace with business needs and provides guaranteed levels of service at predetermined costs.

Formalised institutionalisation of service management processes is crucial to enterprises that are aiming to dynamically align businesses and IT services. This will achieve greater control over IT infrastructure and help improve customer experience.

With the advent of quality management framework such as BS15000 in mid-2003, this problem was addressed. BS15000 provided the much-needed umbrella of quality management principles under which ITIL best practices can be applied and used. There is a thin line between getting it right and doing it wrong. Caution needs to be applied in understanding the people-process-technology triangle. More importantly, emphasis should be on the fact that process comes before technology.

People element also includes the organisational setup. People scattered over a data centre facility or loading up call agents in a service desk may be adding fuel to the fire. Required level of middle management has to be incorporated in the organisational system. Domains such as capacity management, business continuity management, information security management and operations management need to be defined across services rather than on individual systems.

Most technology investments in service management tools go wasted not because of the lack of functionality or limiting nature of possibilities, but due to the inability of the company to recognise the exact processes it wishes to configure the system against. There are also cases where the choice is made for the system to be configured on default configuration or on the industry best practice. This obviously translates into a change in the way the company functions. Hence it becomes more of a process change than the introduction of automation.

Quality improvement

The most common practice is to ensure that there is a definitive management intent and resolute ambition towards quality improvement in the service management domain. This can be embodied through a clear quality policy that describes the discipline and vocalises the direction.

Management buy-in is as important as organisational changes may well be required. Firstly, it is necessary that there is a structure that is responsible for the definition, implementation and continuous improvement of processes within the organisation. Apply this specialised team to study and then define the processes for service management practices that either exist or need to be followed. A good guide can be the BS15000 or IS20000 frameworks that help in defining the scope of the service management domain and the basic requirements expected from it.

At this point it is important to note that writing the processes is by far easier than the implementation, where at times serious flaws are unveiled. To keep the surprises at a minimum, it is imperative that service management staff is involved to conceive and articulate the processes. This way, process champions are created within the service management domain who can assist at the implementation phase.

Implementation of processes depends heavily on how the 'ability to perform' is dispersed. This can be effectively performed by persistent training sessions and practical process mocks. Once the processes are set in motion, it is important that independent assurance and verification is done to judge the compliance to the formalised and base-lined processes. Such assurances need to be performed by individuals having a good command over both the process and framework knowledge.

On average a company can expect noticeable results over a period of 12 to 15 months. People's view to the tool at this stage is highly positive and they see this as an opportunity to do more in less time, thereby increasing their own productivity. This is a good time to consider investing in an enterprise-wide technology solution. Anytime before this may turn out to be wishful thinking. Raising quality in IT service management is a bare necessity of business today. Maturity cannot be acquired and only comes with time.