If your company’s IT department is not performing as well as it should and you realize that the company is losing money because of it, there is a good way to fix it. The ITSM (IT Service Management) methodology is designed to help set up the processes in the IT department of the company so that everything works efficiently, customers are happy, and business makes money.
What is the methodology
There is a traditional approach to organization of IT structures, a resource-based one. In this scheme the main elements are networks, servers and other hardware and technologies. With such a focus “overboard” are the needs of internal and external customers.
ITSM is a conductor of service strategy and prioritizes the needs of users. According to major companies that use this approach (e.g., IBM), it provides an opportunity to reduce operating costs and improve the quality of IT services.
In the ITSM scheme, the IT department acts as a full-fledged service provider for the other structures of the company and its tasks become broader than simple maintenance of the IT infrastructure in the form of specific network nodes.
Why do you need to implement ITSM?
If you implement the ITSM approach intelligently, it can significantly improve efficiency and save resources.
- You’ll outline the exact cost of creating an optimal IT infrastructure.
- Employees will be quicker to make decisions and fix problems.
- Problems will be solved in a systematic way, with analysis and elimination of causes.
- All work processes will be labeled according to their value to the company. This will allow building work more efficiently.
- From the customer’s point of view, the level of services will become higher.
- An efficient IT infrastructure will become the basis for all business processes of the company. It will become more stable and recover from failures more quickly.
How to start working with ITSM
To begin with the company should transfer its relationship with the IT-department on a “customer-supplier” model and formulate what specific services it wants to obtain. After that, the company will demand the same things from the services as the users. As a result, the IT department, by meeting these demands, will begin to work much more efficiently.
The next important step in implementing ITSM is to divide the company’s structure into teams that solve specific business tasks automatically. And to effectively manage them, you need special software platforms.
5 tools to automate ITSM
ServiceNow
One of the most popular ITSM solutions, created by the American company of the same name. Since 2014, the consulting company Gartner every year consistently recognizes the service as the leader of the “Magic Quadrant” among vendors of ITSM products.
One of the main advantages is that it is possible to manage all IT processes through a single interface. Reporting processes, event logging, SLA non-compliance notifications, and much more are all available.
The tool was created to automate the Helpdesk service in IT, but then there are more use cases. The system can be used to manage marketing, finance, HR and other departments. At the same time, all functionality is already included in the solution, you do not need to buy anything extra.
SimpleOne
Universal solution for any company department. It is based on ITIL best practices.
Despite the fact that SimpleOne is an ESM-platform, it works well as an ITSM-solution. Best practices for delivering and managing services for service departments of organizations (ITIL®, VeriSM™) were used in its creation. SimpleOne end-to-end automation enables unified services and a single orchestration tool.
The solution is well suited to large businesses and government agencies that are planning to digitize their daily work. IBS, Devoteam Russia, Croc, IT Guild, ITGLOBAL.COM and others have already chosen SimpleOne. Other advantages are the efficient architecture and user-friendly interface. The solution has been created with a view to the global market from the very beginning.
Naumen Service Desk
The system existing since 2001 is intended for automation of corporate processes in companies of any size. The developers especially emphasize that the solution is suitable for the IT department and technical support. The product was chosen by more than 300 companies in telecommunications, retail, public services and others. The list of clients includes Azbuka Vkusa, Rostec Corporation, Russian Post and others. According to the IT Service Management 2019 study, the product was among the five best ITSM solutions.
Of the disadvantages: you may have to buy the modules you need to get the necessary functionality and not quite a friendly and thoughtful interface.
Service Creatio
Good for a single customer service center and for work of company departments on the basis of ITSM and ITIL methods.
With the system, you can work effectively with problems, requests and incidents, automate business processes, manage releases, internal documentation and configurations. There are two versions, Service Enterprise (for companies) and Customer Center (for customer service).
The system’s disadvantages are that it focuses more on organization of sales than on ITSM methods. It is used by Tele2, OTP Bank, URALSIB Bank, Severstal, ZYXEL, and others.
Itilium
It’s a Russian system, based on 1C and ITIL v2 and ITIL v3 standards. It is suitable for technical support services in IT. If necessary, a license for integration with 1C:Enterprise can be purchased.
The GAZ Group, Rive Gauche, the RF Ministry of Natural Resources and others work with this solution. Of the disadvantages, one can note not quite modern and user-friendly interface, which takes some getting used to. Also, for some companies, the cost of technical support by phone may seem high.
Conclusion
The right ITSM platform will provide your company with a basis for the well-organized work of the IT department, which will systematically improve the state of your business. Choosing a solution, carefully examine its features, how well it fits your company’s objectives and whether it will help you to develop.
