1. 1 Page

2. Synergistic effort using soft skills and
project management techniques in ITSCM
consulting engagement
Rajat Maini – Technology Lead, Infosys Limited

3. Contents
1. Introduction...................................................................................................................................... 4
1.1 Behavioral Competencies ............................................................................................................. 4
1.2 IT Service Continuity Management (ITSCM): ............................................................................... 4
1.2.1 Why ITSCM? ........................................................................................................................... 5
1.2.2 ITSCM Lifecycle ...................................................................................................................... 5
1.2.3 Does ITSCM strategy differ across Industry verticals? ........................................................... 5
2. Disaster Recovery Planning (DRP) ................................................................................................. 6
2.1 Planning a DRP ......................................................................................................................... 6
2.2 Multilateral DRP ........................................................................................................................ 7
3. Linking behavior competencies pragmatically to project management techniques ........................ 7
4. Case Study ...................................................................................................................................... 8
4.1 About Client ............................................................................................................................... 8
4.2 Challenges encountered ........................................................................................................... 8
4.3 Solution approach for Multilateral DRP – Synergistic efforts in blending of behavioral and
project management techniques ............................................................................................... 9
4.4 Critical Success Factors (CSF) ............................................................................................... 10
4.5 Benefits of multilateral DRP .................................................................................................... 10
4.5.1 For client ...............................................................................................................................10
4.5.2 For all partners ......................................................................................................................11
4.6 Pedagogical Outcomes ........................................................................................................... 11
5. Conclusion..................................................................................................................................... 13
6. References .................................................................................................................................... 13
7. Appendix ....................................................................................................................................... 14
8. Author‟s Profile .............................................................................................................................. 15
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4. 1. Introduction
A possible connotation of “Synergy” is “the interaction of elements that when combined produce a
total effect that is greater than the sum of the individual elements, contributions, etc.”
Standard projects with well-defined scope, time and budget components can be executed by following
®
the defined project management processes, tools & techniques from PMBOK . However, with the
vastly changing IT environment it is trending towards the need to deliver projects and programs with
an end-to-end accountability, including delivery from clients and partners. Thus, blending the best
available frameworks on collaborative working, aided with project management techniques becomes
fundamental for a sustainable tomorrow.
In other words, a synergistic effort, involving soft skills along with project management techniques is
required for achieving a successful outcome where clients and partners are involved.
1.1 Behavioral Competencies
Behavioral competency is defined as a skill identified by an organization, as necessary for its
employees to be successful in an organization and/or necessary for employees to be successful in a
specific job. Examples of such behavioral competencies are professionalism, customer service
attributes, working collaboratively, communication skills etc. According to the survey conducted by
Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM) in 2008 on behavioral competency, the samples
collected from 417 randomly selected HR Professionals; behavioral competencies are used in
recruitment, hiring and selection process, performance management, training and development, and
succession planning. Even then, behavioral competencies have been identified for only 24 percent of
specific jobs. The survey also highlighted that 9 percent of HR professionals feel that it is “too new to
measure outcome”.
Dale Carnegie, a writer, and the developer of recognized courses in self-improvement, corporate
training and interpersonal skills, had authored a book „How to Win Friends and Influence People‟ in
1936. In this book, Dale had laid down the guidelines, by virtue of whose practice a person can win
people to his/her way of thinking and influence an outcome. Dale was a firm believer that behavioral
skills of an Individual can be honed. Several organizations are now focused on cultivating behavior
competencies as a professional habit in their employees, by running soft skills development
programs. The question that arises is; how does one hitch a successful outcome pragmatically to
these behavioral competencies and soft skills?
1.2 IT Service Continuity Management (ITSCM):
ITSCM aims to manage risks that could seriously impact IT services. ITSCM ensures that the IT
service provider can always provide minimum agreed Service Levels, by reducing the risk from
disaster events to an acceptable level and planning for the recovery of IT services.
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5. 1.2.1 Why ITSCM?
IT recovery forms an integral part of Business Continuity Planning (BCP). With the growth and
advancement in technology, this however, has simply complicated the Disaster Recovery (DR) of IT
services. An ITSCM describes how continuity is ensured for specific disaster events and services. It
specifies the measures to enhance the resilience of IT services and describes how to effectively
respond to a disaster event.
Note: Organizations which are working in an ITIL (Information Technology Infrastructure Library)
framework call it ITSCM, while others call it DR.
1.2.2 ITSCM Lifecycle
As shown in the pictorial representation of ITSCM lifecycle (below), it can be divided into six important
phases of the processes, each process is dependent on all other processes & machinery stops if one
process fails.
Figure 1 : ITSCM Lifecycle
A brief description of each phase is listed below:
Phase Description
Assess the present scenario, the requirements (Business & Technology) &
Assess & Analyze
the feasibility for the next phase of planning & designing the ITSCM solution
Plan & Design Define & strategize „Plan of Action‟ for implementing DR / BCP capability
Create the DR solution which is completely aligned with the planned ITSCM
Solution Build
solution
Test Test the built solution developed for its effectiveness & efficiency
Rollout of the solution into live environment. Also Training & Creating
Solution Rollout & Training
Awareness about the program & business solution.
Maintain the built solution & improve the solution to ensure parity with
Maintain & Improve
present industry best practices & meet the industry standards
*Reference: Infosys – ITSCM Tool Kit
1.2.3 Does ITSCM strategy differ across Industry verticals?
The characteristics and features of every industry vertical are different and so is their ITSCM strategy.
Financial sector had traditionally led the way in development of ITSCM due to a number of factors:
• The time horizons under which it operate
• Influence of financial regulations and regulators
Manufacturing industry requires different type of ITSCM strategies than financial sectors due to:
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6. • Supply-Chain dependency on the environment
• Managing Just-In-Time (JIT) inventory
• Manufacturing facilities are handling disasters on a daily basis (e.g. equipment breakdown in
plant, component manufactured is not being up to the quality standard)
This paper explains about Infosys‟ approach of using soft skills and project management techniques
in an ITSCM consulting (Assess and Analyze Phase) engagement. Infosys had to analyze the
business requirements and technology needs for a manufacturing client and provide consultancy
services in disaster recovery planning for one of their critical applications.
Note: The ITSCM lifecycle or its strategy development is not being discussed in this document, but its
existence is mentioned for completeness.
2. Disaster Recovery Planning (DRP)
A disaster can strike anytime, anywhere and in any organization including yours. When a disaster
strikes, it tends to compromise the capability of an organization to achieve its mission, it erodes its
reputation, brand value and image; and in adverse cases, its customer base, market share and its
profitability. Thus, an organization must have a Disaster Recovery Plan; a documented, tested and
verified procedure to recover from disasters.
2.1 Planning a DRP
The Disaster Recovery Planning requires a structured, methodical and comprehensive approach, for
an organization to achieve its operational capability once a disaster strikes. Thus, a DRP is required
to be executed as a „Project‟ leveraging the guidelines laid down by Project Management Institute
®
(PMI) in PMBOK .
Each organization consists of three components as depicted in Figure 2 below. These are:
• Process – Provides details on
delivering products and services to
client
• Participants – One‟s who participate
in the execution of each business
process
• Infrastructure and Resources – Used
in the execution of the business
process
Figure 2 : Elements of an Organization
These three elements of an organization are tightly integrated through information flow. Progressive
organizations are keeping themselves precocious by maintaining a DRP, which protects their
organization from disasters.
In a DRP, importance is given to the recovery of IT Infrastructure and IT Services. Project Manager
can effectively manage the recovery of IT Services as an independent item using the guidelines from
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7. ®
PMBOK . For an end-to-end recovery for business continuity, requires resumption of business and
information flow. But, what should an organization do for an end-to-end recovery? Let us analyze a
few questions, which may bring a new perspective, which are repetitively overlooked while planning a
DR.
What happens if a disaster transpires in your outsourced contact center? How does it impact
your operations? What is the impact on your business?
What if your third party technology service provider fails you due to lack of DRP?
What happens if your key technical client has a disaster? What is the impact on you?
What happens if your key supplier of raw materials or information has a disaster? What must
you do to support their recovery efforts?
What is the impact on your customer, suppliers and business partners if you‟ve a disaster?
What would you want them to do to support your recovery efforts?
2.2 Multilateral DRP
In view of the situation arising out the questions written above, it is pertinent to address Business-to-
Business integration that grows under the banner of „cost sharing‟, „outsourcing‟, „collaboration‟ and
„cooperation‟. Thus, the need to extend our DR planning endeavors to our clients and partners. In
other words, plan for a multilateral disaster recovery involving your outsourced IT partners, vendors,
suppliers and customers.
Solutions to the above questions would give you few reasons, as to why a “Multilateral DRP” when
taken up as a project must go beyond the borders of project management. You (i.e., Project Manager)
need to have an additional quality of behavioral competencies to influence an outcome. So, what
should be the approach to mix behavior competencies with project management techniques?
3. Linking behavior competencies pragmatically to project
management techniques
Breaking down the guidelines laid down by Dale Carnegie in his book “How to win friends and
influence people” on behavior competency for pragmatically influencing decision making and linking
them with project management guidelines.
Dale Carnegie’s
Behavior Attribute advice on Behavior Pragmatic Approach Technique Used
competency
Fundamental Establish a team
Don't criticize, Encourage
technique in Handling Plan joint
condemn or complain participation
people workshops
Become genuinely
Publish RACI &
interested in other
Provide a common promote Mentoring
Ways to make people people
platform to all
like you Talk in terms of the
participants Joint assessment
other person's
sessions
interests.
Win people to your Dramatize your ideas Visualize your thoughts Plan for Interactive
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8. way of thinking and seek others discussions
confirmation Conduct awareness
sessions
Visual Reporting
displaying progress
Publish all
Take decisions based proposed options
Ask questions instead
on data shared and and Negotiate with
of giving direct orders
analysis performed all participants for
Be a leader
final decision
Use encouragement. Re-visit the plan based Document the Plan
Make the fault seem on learning and Regularly update it
easy to correct. experience and share with all
Multilateral DRP is reliant upon mentoring and availability of human resources, confirmed scope of
the project along with the extent of Information disclosure and sharing amongst all partners.
4. Case Study
The case study involves the experience of a successful consummation of multilateral DRP for a
manufacturing client by Infosys. Infosys project governance team overcame disparate set of
challenges by exhibiting the blend of behavior traits & project management techniques.
4.1 About Client
A leading producer of Nickel from Canada with its parent firm being the second biggest mining
company in the world, operating in 38 countries, spread across 5 continents and employs over
126,000 people.
4.2 Challenges encountered
• Client had subscribed to Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) from another IT service provider. This
IT Service provider was irresolute on sharing any information with Infosys for the fear of
disclosure of proprietary information external to its organization
• One of the main components of this application was developed and maintained by another
partner, requiring participation from a Vendor and a partner. There was lack of support from both,
partners and vendors due to low priority given to multilateral DRP
• Scope of this multilateral DRP to be agreed with all business partners
• Limited budget for DR Planning and very stringent timelines to be met
• Solution being relevant to Client‟s business requirements and strategic needs
• Solution should be designed using the existing IT infrastructure with minimal additional
investment
• Critical human resources being unavailable during the initial phase of requirement gathering
• Project resources (of Infosys) working from three different countries and two different time zones
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9. 4.3 Solution approach for Multilateral DRP – Synergistic efforts in blending of
behavioral and project management techniques
The under mentioned steps are derived from the process of Infosys‟ practical approach of providing
consultancy service for a Multilateral DRP involving client, its third party technology partners and
vendors. Infosys project governance team managed it as a project utilizing the project management
®
framework from PMBOK and its concomitant behavioral attributes to influence a successful outcome.
1. Conducting awareness: To obtain management buy-in from the organization and to involve
the business partners from the very beginning by engaging them from the Initiation phase.
Emphasize on importance of using approach that is suitable for both the message being
transmitted and the targeted audience.
2. Establish a project team: To overcome coordination hassles and information sharing
amongst business partners, a project team (from all partners) including a project manager
has to be identified at the onset of this project. The end objective is to obtain resource
commitment, mentoring them and to coordinate DR Planning activities. To maintain the
objective and unbiased acceptance of the proposed solutions, it may be prudent for client to
act as a project facilitator. The project facilitator would function as a project manager,
ensuring all participants are treated equally, continue the flow of information amongst all
participants and facilitate decision making.
3. Publishing a RACI matrix: Allocating team members would not suffice until the roles and
responsibilities are communicated. Allow the „Accountable‟ to mentor the „Responsible‟, who
as Protégés starts to observe and explore. Design the alliance, and be clear about what this
relationship will look like and how it will be managed.
4. Publish the strategy statement: Based on the agreement with all partners, publish a
strategy statement encompassing all aspects of a project management plan along with all
workable options proposed to contain a disaster and recovery of IT Services in multilateral
environment. All options proposed (and published) may not be acceptable to all partners.
Project manager must consider all options as a „Negotiable‟ attribute. Most important tip to
successful negotiation is to control your emotion, remain calm, and be genuinely interested in
others opinions & concerns; then put across your point of view.
5. Obtain strategy approval: It‟s imperative that all partner organizations understands and
supports the DRP. This step is deemed necessary as a formal review and approval before an
organization‟s disclosure of proprietary information external to its organization for a DRP.
6. Plan for interactive discussion(s) on information sharing: An information critical to one
partner may not be relevant for another. Thus, we need to plan for interactive discussions,
where participants would identify disaster scenarios in a multilateral environment, analyze the
situation together, and conclude it with identification and agreement to a bilateral solution.
The objective is to put a framework together to analyze this situation on a continual basis and
continue with the cadence setup to initiate discussions on DRP with suppliers & business
partners.
7. Conducting interdependency assessment: It is necessary to obtain an understanding of
the impact of a disaster from all partners‟ perspective. A disaster may have a varied impact
on all partners. Provide a framework to all partners to conduct their own impact assessment
of all known disasters. You are not asking all partners to do a multilateral DR assessment, but
rather participating in their process and learning from their experience.
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10. 8. Conducting resolution workshops: Provide an interactive method to ease out the flaws
from the solution design considering all partners opinions. It is the responsibility of project
managers to ensure that a common solution is adopted.
9. Prepare a joint implementation plan: These are worked out concurrently with resolution
workshops. Establish joint implementation teams to ensure a timely and accurate completion
of tasks.
10. Document multilateral DRP: Documentation is the easiest step in the overall process. It is
important that all partners adopt a common implementation schedule, conducting regular
reviews, keeping their respective management abrasive about the developments and above
all follow a common structure and content for the DR Plan. This ensures an easier change
transition within each organization and its subsequent reviews.
Note: The steps though mentioned sequentially, were executed as per the Project Management
processes
4.4 Critical Success Factors (CSF)
Infosys identified critical success factors for this project as behavioral attributes. These were:
1. Participation and continuous engagement from all partners: Infosys planned for it by
a. Setting up of daily cadence for its project team
b. Weekly cadence for steering committee
c. Joint workshops for solution development and its reviews with partners and client
d. Phase end reviews jointly by partners and client
2. Finalized Scope: Infosys overcame technology based interfaces between two partners by
e. Conducting awareness workshop
f. Conducting walkthrough sessions on the end project objectives
g. Joint workshops including all partners and client to finalize the scope
h. Publishing the project strategy statement along with RACI matrix to all participants
3. Cooperation & Compromise: It gets difficult to get productive participation from resources
within the same organization. The complexity increase 10-folds when dealing in a multilateral
DRP. The CSF here is to maintain a mindset of cooperation and compromise.
4. Creating an environment conducive for solution creation: Infosys could do so by facilitating
joint resolution workshops and by tracking all pending issues in an Issue log. This issue log
gets reviewed by steering committee on a weekly basis.
5. Patience is the key in a multilateral DRP: General cooperation was superficially maintained.
Infosys was able to get the information sharing flow ongoing by creating a meeting and action
item tracker, which holds the minutes of the meetings along with Information requested from
partners, its responsibility and ETA. The same was shared with the steering committee on a
weekly basis to overcome hassles of non-cooperation from participants.
4.5 Benefits of multilateral DRP
4.5.1 For client
Benefits derived by the client due to successful execution of this consulting project by Infosys were:
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11. • Assessment blueprint that provides a consolidated view of impact to recovery of all
infrastructure components
• DR solution that leverages all aspects of the current IT infrastructure with no additional
investment
• Multiple technically viable options of each component to meet DR requirements
• Scientific way of selecting solution recommendation which was in line with the DR strategy
• A solution Implementation plan which acts as a baseline project plan for implementing DR
solution recommendations
• DR Strategy that provides a roadmap to meet the business requirement
4.5.2 For all partners
Multilateral DRP has number of benefits for all partners, including:
• Advanced level of preparedness with business partners, in recovering from disasters. This
promotes an interdependent relationship and further advances business-to-business
integration
• Strengthening the functioning relationship amongst all partners by continuous supply of
business and information flow
• Measurable competitive advantage in IT Service Continuity Management for each partner
• Extended influence and support external to the organization, improves the brand value and
reputation
• Interactions by management and staff will strengthen the operational interface between
partners
4.6 Pedagogical Outcomes
Lessons learnt are documented below as a sustainable guide for eradicating common pitfalls, for
project managers who intend to take up multilateral application disaster recovery planning projects.
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12. 12 Page

13. 5. Conclusion
Unexpected events and incidents can become disasters. Disasters can strike any organization, your
organization as well. A disaster recovery management is about being able to recover (or resume) IT
services „without missing a beat‟.
Today‟s organizations are driven by business and information flow, integrated with its business
partners. Each core element of an organization has several direct and indirect dependencies on its
business partners for disaster recovery, some of which are beyond the boundaries that can be
controlled alone by project management. Thus, an organization can achieve a multilateral disaster
recovery planning by.
• Driving it as a project - leveraging all aspects of project management techniques
• Influencing the decision making on business & information flow from business partners
through behavioral competencies
A project manager requires exhibiting an approach which blends with behavioral competencies and
project management techniques, to influence decision making towards a successful multilateral DRP.
6. References
1. Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM) – Does your organization identify
behavioral skills for an employee‟s success? – Poll Findings available at
http://www.shrm.org/research/surveyfindings/articles/pages/identifybehavioralskills.aspx (last
accessed in June 2012)
2. Wikipedia® - Dale Carnegie – Available at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dale_Carnegie (last
accessed in June 2012)
3. Wikipedia® - ITSCM – Available at: http://wiki.en.it-
processmaps.com/index.php/IT_Service_Continuity_Management (last accessed in June
2012)
4. Wikipedia® - Business continuity planning – Available at:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Business_continuity_planning (last accessed in June 2012)
5. Wikipedia® - Disaster Recovery – Available at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disaster_recovery
(last accessed in June 2012)
6. iPRISE (Integrated Process Repository for IT Infrastructure Service Excellence) – Infosys‟s
reusable process repository for IT Infrastructure process
7. Infosys‟s ITSCM Tool Kit
8. The Definitive Handbook of Business Continuity Management (Second Edition) by Andrew
Hiles FBCI – Published in 2008 by John Wiley & Sons, Ltd publications
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14. 7. Appendix
Name Explanation
IT Service Continuity Management A process by which plans are put in place and managed to ensure
(ITSCM) that IT services can recover and continue if a service failure occurs.
Identifies [an] organization's exposure to internal and external
threats and synthesizes hard and soft assets to provide effective
Business Continuity Planning
prevention and recovery for the organization, whilst maintaining
(BCP)
competitive advantage and value system integrity”. BCP is working
out how to continue operations under adverse conditions.
A condition in which an IT service is unavailable leading to
Disaster
significant disruption in executing normal business activities
It is the process, policies and procedures related to preparing for
Disaster Recovery (DR) recovery or continuation of technology infrastructure critical to an
organization after a natural or human-induced disaster.
A Plan which describes how an organization is to deal with
Disaster Recovery Plan (DRP)
disasters
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15. 8. Author’s Profile
Rajat works with Infosys as a Technology Lead. He
is a PMP certified professional and has 8 years of IT
Industry experience. He holds a Bachelor of
Engineering in Electronics and Communication. His
strengths include process analysis, driving service
optimization and executing continual service
improvement initiatives.
Email: Rajat_Maini@Infosys.com or
Rajat.Maini@gmail.com
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