Monitoring and Event Management automation are major elements of ITSM On-Ramp™ Services, but not the only elements. Service monitoring intelligence can directly address silos and tribal IT cultures, but it requires more than an IT view of services. Establishing a business lane for your ITSM Road Map is a critical (and often missing) element of success.
In a few recent posts on Minding the Gap, I ranted about the Customer Expectation Management Method (CEMM), dependency management, and suggested that IT could focus on applications initially but that ultimately an understanding of business processes will be needed to address the Gap.
Different Mindsets
If you were to say the word “segment” to an IT professional, most would quickly think of a Local Area Network. Mention the same word to a business professional and they are likely to think about a customer segment.
This difference in mindset contributes to the gap between IT and the business, and ITIL©’s Service Strategy does comment on it:
“A clear understanding of what the customer values is called a marketing mindset, compared to a manufacturing mindset. Rather than focusing inward on the production of services, look from the outside in, from the customer’s point of view.”
- ITIL© Service Strategy, page 85-86
Sound familiar?
Of course having an inward focus is not limited to IT. Many businesses fall into the trap of immersing themselves in ‘the system’ or ‘the application’. In fact, the pressure to integrate IT with the Business can sometimes drive this inward focus.
However most of the time the business is not involved in the ITIL© Road Map very much, if at all, and this presents major issues for adoption of ITSM and service monitoring automation.
Driving into the Ditch
So, you’ve decided to automate Event Management and install a service monitoring automation solution. Congratulations! You have taken an important step towards addressing tribal IT cultures head-on.
Unfortunately, service monitoring automation projects are inherently wicked. IT is very familiar with point products, which provide value to various IT domains and can actually re-enforce tribal values. But of much greater concern is the lack of business involvement.
You’re back to monitoring ‘infrastructure’, applications are left out, and you basically drive yourself into a ditch. You’ve built the foundation, but cannot understand the blueprint for the house. This is the bottom-up approach to defining services, and ITIL© says something about this too:
“Design from the top down”
“Implement from the bottom up”
- ITIL© Service Design, page 41
In fact, what often happens is the establishment of a technical catalog of services that makes very good sense to IT but leaves the business yawning in disinterest. You had a manufacturing mindset!
Establishing a Marketing Mindset
IPAPI’s Outside-in Perspective and Successful Customer Outcomes leverage techniques that can establish a marketing mindset for both IT and the business.
What is needed by IT is a clear definition and understanding of critical business processes. What are needed by the business are improved customer focus, optimized business processes and innovation.
The IPAPI and ITIL© training standalone quite well; but together they provide an opportunity to mind the gap and move much closer to a marketing mindset for both. It’s important to understand that paving a business lane for your ITIL© Road Map does not force you to merge both efforts into joint meetings, duplicate efforts and lots of cross-training.
Of course IT will still need a technical catalog of services, and application monitoring will still move you closer to the business. But achieving a marketing mindset in the context of IT service management absolutely requires an understanding of business processes by both IT and the business.
The IPAPI Process Management Framework is perfectly suited as a business lane for your ITIL© Road Map. Top down design of management architectures require an understanding of business needs --- a marketing mindset.
Getting business people engaged and involved through the IPAPI Process Management Framework can help increase their understanding of critical business processes, keep them focused on external customers, and broadens the level of sponsorship for service monitoring automation (and ITSM adoption) programs --- critically needed for these Wicked projects!
Moving from an installation of service monitoring software, to an implementation of Event Management and ITSM, requires a program of services tailored to both business and IT interests. This can help foster a marketing mindset, and is part of the Right Road to ITSM Excellence.