IT Transformation is quickly becoming one of the primary responses from Enterprises are seeking to convert IT from an Operational Asset to a Tactical and Strategic Asset. The paper describes the methodology created by Action Research Foundation for Practical ITSM transformation

1. Moving IT Service Management from Operational
to Tactical and Strategic Levels using Practical
ITSM Transformation Techniques
FlexModeIP Service Oriented Architecture IT Service Management
Transformation Framework
Sukumar Daniel
Action Researcher.

2. Table of Contents
Introduction ...................................................................................................................................... 3
FlexMode ITSM SOA Framework – A Paradigm Shift ........................................................................ 4
Practical values from Adopting the FlexModeIP SOA ITSM Framework ............................................. 5
FlexModeIP Transformation Process Lifecycle .................................................................................. 6
Critical Success Factors and Pre-requisites: ...................................................................................... 9
Frequently Asked Questions: .......................................................................................................... 10
Vyom ITSMS Transformation Practice Service Offerings: ................................................................11
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3. Introduction
World economy has gone through many crises and enterprises across the globe are seeking to
leverage Information and Communication Technologies to support and enhance their ability to
survive, compete and grow in a depressed and uncertain environment.
The challenge for the CIO is to navigate this turmoil today, while also building a foundation for
success tomorrow. Current economic realities are driving changes to enterprise priorities, which in
turn, are driving changes to the CIO’s IT priorities.
To survive and thrive in this uncertain economy organisations are facing the need to expand their IT
service management strategies from an operational level to tactical and strategic levels to address
business process automation, market globalization and the increasing dependency on IT for the
efficient and reliable management and delivery of core business services.
To address this requirement formalized service management processes and specialized service and
work management tools are being introduced to manage today’s complex and distributed IT
environments. Introducing service management processes into internal IT departments requires a
transformation to the IT culture. Most internal IT departments are system/technology
management-based organizations which are reactive in nature.
Transforming to a service-management-based organization
is more proactive in nature and is a step to aligning IT with
business. It is also fundamental to achieving the goal of
providing efficient and reliable management and delivery of
core business services.
The Vyom ITSMS Transformation Practice, provides
specialist services that use Iterative Organizational change
and development techniques that enable an enterprise to
rapidly design and deploy an ITSM Framework; covering the
People – Process – Tool – Partnership, Dimensions.
The proprietary FlexModeIP Framework for Practical ITSM transformation has been validated time
and again in programs that yielded measureable and visible value to enterprise IT Management in
improving the effectiveness of their services in a wide range of domains.
A hallmark of FlexModeIP is its very logical and practical approach to transformation that uses
Research and Action in Cyclical Iterations to establish Successive Baselines of operational
transparency and to use the data to move measurably to the next level of effectiveness. This makes
for transformation that moves from one quick win to the other; thereby developing an ever
increasing understanding and commitment for change from all stakeholders.
Starting with the ING Bank operations in India, the FlexModeIP framework has been continually
improved through adoption in different domains such as Automobile Manufacturing and the Retail
Industry. Its customers have received international recognition for outstanding achievements. Tata
Motors won the ICMG 2010 Enterprise & IT Architecture Excellence in ITSM award and Tesco Stores
won the same award subsequently in the year 2011.
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4. FlexMode ITSM SOA Framework – A Paradigm Shift
Commonly used project management structures and frameworks fail to take into account the softer
aspects involved in organizational change such as resistance to change, gaining commitment,
empowering, motivating, involving and communicating. Experience reveals that it is precisely these
aspects that prevent many initiatives from realizing their intended aims.
Business and IT Service Management executives are beginning to understand the need to change
“ways of working” in the way IT services are delivered and managed. However, many are skeptical
as they have seen initiatives to implement ITIL and other such frameworks or tools, fail to deliver on
promises, despite high levels of commitment and incurring related expenses.
The failure factors are many; however the primary root cause seems to be a mono focus on either
Processes or technology tool and the ensuing treatment of these initiatives like any normal project
for implementing something and have a definite beginning and ending.
IT Service Management on the other hand is a way of life; it is a framework for management and
needs to be implemented in a sustainable and extensible manner and moved from development to
sustenance the way any business process is established.
A continual improvement engine will be a visible and integral part of the DNA of an organization that
follows the principles of IT service Management.
The FlexModeIP ITSM SOA Framework Methodology
brings in a paradigm shift to IT transformation by
focusing on the soft aspects and helps the organisation
to mount the transformation Initiative as an
Organisational Change and Development Program
instead of a Process or Tool implementation Project.
The framework involves people who are most affected
by the change and focusses on building collaboration
between various groups and 3rd parties involved in
providing the services; on an end-to-end basis
Using Enterprise Architecture Principles, it enables the organisation to implement a, business
aligned, IT Service Management Framework that establishes a Service Oriented Architecture to
help manage services on an End-to-End Basis and transform from traditional Technology
Management to a Service Oriented Management Paradigm.
It enables the enterprise to establish an IT Service Management System by leveraging best
practices from ITIL, ISO 20000, CoBit and other International Knowledge Bases and embedding the
processes in a service management tool suite configured to track services on an end-to-end basis.
The Measurement framework thus established; provides the organisation a quality view of IT
services on an End-to-End basis. The SOA is used to establish a Baseline of the Service Quality and
enables the Identification of primary issues in Service delivery, identify improvement opportunities
and mount systematic service improvement programs to continually improve customer outcomes.
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5. Practical values from Adopting the FlexModeIP SOA ITSM Framework
 Transform the IT to a service-management-based organization, to become more proactive
in nature; by aligning IT with Business and bringing the focus on continual improvement of
Customer Outcomes by managing the service supply chain on an end-to-end basis.
 Enable uniform ways of working in the People, Process, Tools and Partnership dimensions,
across the enterprise, using a standard framework of roles and responsibilities which bridge
the service-technology silos and embeds a service oriented approach to IT Service
Management.
 Establish collaboration between Business Users, Internal IT teams and 3rd Party Service
Providers and bring a focus on the customer outcomes of business users across
Infrastructure, Software and Support aspects of the Supply Chain.
 Leverage investments by deploying new, existing or upgraded application and technology
to establish an automation layer to create Transparency of how IT services are provided to
business processes on an End-to-End Basis instead of the traditional Technology Silo Basis.
 Develop capability to track, report analyze and improve incidents, Service Requests,
Problem, Change Requests and other transaction resolutions through the entire supply
chain with transparency of how various involved support groups have participated and
collaborated in providing effective services to end customers.
 Establish a “Transformation Oriented” Measurement Framework layer above the
Transaction oriented Metrics layers, traditionally used to manage IT Service Silos, by
collecting and crafting configuration data using the FlexModeIP ITSM SOA framework and
establish Data Mining Capability for Analysis and easy identification of Improvement
Opportunities.
 Embed the ITSM SOA foundation data, associated processes and controls in existing or
upgraded IT Service management Tools, with minimal application changes, for establishing
a Management information System which will act as a single source of truth for IT Service
Management.
 Establish effective periodic reviews of formal service improvement programs to track and
verify the improvement, in processes and support performance quality, on an end-to-end
service oriented basis.
 Embed the Continual Improvement PDCA Cycle in the DNA of the IT Service Management
System of the organisation thereby improving the effectiveness and efficiency of IT
Services and their alignment with business needs.
 Provide capability for IT management at all levels to show case their achievements in
increasing effectiveness and lowering costs of services.
 Enable the Governance of IT services by the business in a structured manner to ensure that
IT continues to improve its relevance to the business as it strives to excel in the marketplace
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6. FlexModeIP Transformation Process Lifecycle
The FlexMode’s secret to success lies in its
application of John P. Kotter’s “Eight Steps to
Transforming your Organization” as a
practical and systematic approach to
organisational transformation.
LC Stage 1: Status Discovery Assessment
and Transformation Strategy Crafting
This stage covers the first three steps from the
Kotter Framework. A status assessment is
done to establish a baseline of the existing
customer focus, management and operational
practices, tools, management reporting and
culture currently operating in the
organisation.
Interviews with the Management of the IT services, Key Business Users, IT Staff and where possible
with the management of 3rd Party Service Providers are conducted and quantitative and qualitative
data is collected to provide a clear understanding of the existing baseline and the expected
outcomes and expectations of the organisation and its management.
The key deliverable of this stage is the identification of a clear objective that will act as a focal point
and infuse the people who are involved with IT Service Provisioning with a sense of urgency and
purpose for the Initiative.
The scope of the initiative, the initial Pilot Services, tool related resources and infrastructure
requirements etc., are also identified and a strategic road map is crafted in collaboration with the
management of the Internal IT Service Organisation and other key stakeholders.
A steering Committee is appointed and key individuals, who will participate as team members in the
program, by acting as single point of contact (SPOC) for the respective operational groups or
functions, are identified. Commitment for their involvement is negotiated with relevant managers.
LC Stage 2: Communicating the Change Vision
A kick-off meeting is conducted by the senior executive management of IT and Business, where
possible, to communicate the vision, scope and expectations from the Initiative.
Post the Kick-Off Meeting, Competency development actions are undertaken to ensure that people
involved in IT service provision are prepared to embrace the change. This is done by conducting a 2
day IT Service Management foundation workshop for a broad spectrum of the IT Service
provisioning community, where possible, it is highly recommended that key individuals from the
Business user community and 3rd Party Service Provider, staff could also be included.
By ensuring that people from all areas such as Infrastructure, Application and Service Management
are included, this foundation workshop is a key enabler of the FlexModeIP methodology and plays a
crucial role in preparing the people, by establishing a favorable collaborative mindset in preparation
for the change initiative.
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7. LC Stage 3: Empowering Staff for Broad-Based Action
Change is usually easier to achieve when those affected by the change are involved. This step is
where the action starts, Key individuals from the business user community, Application Support,
Infrastructure Support, Customer Contact center and IT Service Management identified and
appointed as SPOC for their relevant organisational function are fused into a project team.
The SPOC identified in stage 1, will form a virtual
team that will learn the techniques related to
building the IT Service Management System of the
organisation. A project management office which
will eventually become the Service Quality
Monitoring group will be set up to co-ordinate all the
activities.
An ITSM Transformation Techniques Practioner
Workshop will be held. This will build on the lessons
learnt in the in the Foundation Workshop and teach
the requirements of the ISO 2000, International
Standard for IT Service management Systems.
Using custom built case studies FlexModeIP templates the team will commence collecting the
Service Oriented Architecture data for modeling the Business Organisation and its alignment with
the IT organisation. A Master List of Services which will form the root of the service catalogue,
which will be configured in the Service Management Tool in the next step, will also be created.
LC Stage 4: Generating Short-Term Wins
Action Research Methodology is based on the
fact that people learn by doing. Keeping this
axiom in mind the team will collect SOA
foundation data for a selected set of services.
Typically these may include end user services,
infrastructure services and some selected
application services.
The Incident management process will be the
first process to be configured and released on
the Service management tool. The FlexModeIP
templates will be used the project team
members to create an end-to-end view of the service and its underlying infrastructure landscape,
including SLA and OLA.
The classification data will itself form the primary Service Catalogue master list and establish a
Service Oriented Architecture to the classificaiton of Incidents and requests based on the Services.
This methodology makes it easy for the organisation to expose the incident classification tree to the
end customers as it is based on Services and the Symptoms usually experienced by users.
The closure category framework data will provide tracebility to the underlying infrastructure
without the need to implement a complex CMDB type of solution by working at Logical CI levels.
This will enable the tool to provide realtime tracking and analysis using pareto charts which can be
directly used to identify improvement oppurtunities and mount Service Improvement Programs.
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8. LC Stage 5: Consolidate Gains and Produce more change.
In this stage the focus is on generating transactional and
transformational Metrics and initiating the PDCA cycle
for improving quality of both services and the service
management system that is used to provide the service.
The end-to-end SOA architecture that FlexMode
implements in the service management tool is leveraged
to produce reports traditionally used by operational
management. These reports cover the tracking of
Workloads and the status of support activities of different
support groups and 3rd Party Service Providers, based on
Incident Tickets and Service requests.
Purpose built hierarchal reports provide information relevant, timely and accurate and for the
operational needs of Executives, Service Owners, Support Group Managers and Engineers. These
reports also fulfill a critical need for reporting to Business, the quantum of work done by IT.
The end-to-end SOA configuration provides an
additional transformational layer that provides
Service Quality information to enable the
operation of the PDCA cycle to improve Service
quality levels by identifying improvement
opportunities in the underlying service
management system.
Depending upon the capability of the Reporting
Tools available, data can be extracted to create V
model Pareto charts, used to identify ‘Top 3
Issues’ in each service, that generate incidents,
based on ‘User Experience’ configured in the Incident Classification. The associated Resolution
Classification data can then be used to identify the CI components of the Infrastructure supply chain
and actions on the relevant CI that the support staff is taking to resolve the incidents for these ‘Top
3 Issues’.
Each project Team is then tasked with identifying improvement opportunities and mounting a
service improvement project either on the service or the service management system, including
actions to improve data quality, to deliver quick wins.
The Project Teams will work in collaboration across the service supply chain; analysis of incidents
will also include identifying repeat incidents that are being resolved by the Service Desk, which can
be reduced by actions taken in the Application and Infrastructure Support Groups.
Effectiveness and efficiencies of Support actions and meeting of SLA and OLA targets will also be
targeted and systematic improvement actions will be tasked and mounted. After making
improvements to the configuration process and processes embedded into the tool, scaling of the
release to other services and the enterprise at large will be progressed.
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9. LC Stage 6: Anchor New Approaches in the Culture.
In this stage the focus is on improving existing governance mechanisms and establishing a formal,
Business Outcome focused, Service Improvement Program Process in the IT Organisation. Existing
review performance review and associated Recognition and Reward mechanisms are reviewed and
improved by including the new service performance and quality reports that are generated in the
previous stage.
The required culture for continually improving customer outcomes will be steadily built by establish
a governance heartbeat that monitors and guides the IT organisation to continually improve its
service delivery capabilities in a systematic manner.
The Project Management Office is disbanded and transformed into a Service Quality Monitoring
Group. The SQMG will be tasked with ensuring that the PDCA cycle is operated systematically and
that continuity of purpose is maintained.
The SQMG group will oversee further extension into the other Service Management Process such as
Service Level Management, Problem Management and Change Management Processes, Portfolio
Management, Service Catalogue Management, Configuration Management, SDLC improvements
and so on.
This will establish the required infrastructure to ensure that the IT organisation continues to develop
its capability to become more proactive in nature; by aligning IT with Business and bringing the
focus on continual improvement of Customer Outcomes by managing the service supply chain on
an end-to-end basis.
Critical Success Factors and Pre-requisites:
Management commitment:
 Appoint a Management Representative with Executive Authority as the Initiative Owner
 Taking Steps to Engage the Business in the Initiative
 Ongoing, visible participation in activities such as creating vision, communicating vision,
direction setting and decision making, when appropriate.
 Attending Steering Committee meetings and ensuring that bottle necks are resolved and
that the initiative continues to stay on course.
 Ensuring People are committed and that they consider actions related to the initiative as
part of their normal day to day activities instead of being an add-on.
 Ensuring collaboration between various divisions in the IT organisation including Contact
Center Management, Application Development and Support, Infrastructure Management
and 3rd Party Service Providers.
 Approving and communicating Policies and ensuring compliance to the same
 Including Initiative related actions in staff performance appraisal
 Establishing a Service Quality Monitoring Group as an Independent Entity.
Resource Provisioning:
 Project Management Office Staffing
 Service Management Tool and staff required configuring or re-configuring foundation data
 Reporting Tool and adequate staffing to create required Reports and or Excel Templates
 Ensuring that SPOC from various support groups, management function and business are
allocated and are encouraged to meet initiative targets
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10. Frequently Asked Questions:
What is the role of Transformation Consultant in the Initiative?
The consultant shall play the role of the Action Researcher, Chief Architect and Subject Matter
Expert. Additionally he will be co-owner for the Project Management Office.
How much time does the Initiative take?
Quality is a never ending climb. The primary objective of the initiative is to put in place the
mechanisms required for a baseline view of the end-to-end supply chain and establish a first cut of
the organization’s Service Management System and its automation layer.
The typical time frame for the first baseline is normally 3 to 6 months. This of course has many
dependencies including the existing culture, capability maturity of the management and their
commitment, quality and availability of appropriate tools and the competencies available for
support.
What are the cost elements that need to be considered?
Costs include direct costs such as cost of consultant, Competency building Workshops, tools,
support of tools, Project Management team, etc.,. Indirect costs include time taken by SPOC and
team members in the initial phase and costs of sustenance and scaling of Service Management
tools.
What are the risks? (Drawn from the ITIL CSI Publication)
 Being over-ambitious – don’t try to improve everything at once. Be realistic with timelines
and expectations
 Not discussing improvement opportunities with the business – the business has to be
involved in improvement decisions that will impact them
 Not focusing on improving both services and service management processes
 Not prioritizing improvement projects
 Implementing Continual Service Improvement with little or no technology
 Implementing a CSI initiative with no resources – this means that people must be allocated
and dedicated to this
 Implementing CSI without knowledge transfer and training – this means educating first
(acquire knowledge), then training (practice using the newly acquired knowledge). The
training should be done as close to the launch of improvement as possible
 Not performing all steps of the 7-Step Improvement Process – it is important that all steps
of the improvement process be followed; missing any one step can lead to a poor decision
on what and how to improve
Are there any Success Stories and references?
Starting with the ING Bank operations in India, the FlexModeIP framework has been continually
improved through adoption in different domains such as Automobile Manufacturing and the Retail
Industry. Its customers have received international recognition for outstanding achievements. Tata
Motors won the ICMG 2010 Enterprise & IT Architecture Excellence in ITSM award and Tesco Stores
won the same award subsequently in the year 2011.
Further information can be found at http://in.linkedin.com/in/sukumardaniel
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11. Vyom ITSMS Transformation Practice Service Offerings:
 ITSMS Transformation Status Discovery Assessment and Strategy Building
o Rapid Assessment by experienced consultants covering the four dimensions of
People, Processes, tools (Products) and Partnership
o Self-Assessment Workshops
o Collaborative development of Transformation Initiative Strategies that deliver value
results
 FlexModeIP Practical ITSM Transformation Techniques Competency Building
o Preparing the organisation and the people for transformation Initiatives to custom
build IT Service Management Systems
o Structured Competency building in ITSM Transformation Techniques
o Custom built programs for all phases of the ITIL Service Management Lifecycle
 ITSMS Transformation Program Architecture, Design and Management using
FlexModeIP ITSMS SOA Framework
o Creating Program Roadmap
o Establishing Program Management Office and administering transformation
initiative processes
o Establishing Program Governance
 ITSMS SOA framework, Tools Implementation Management
o Architectural Services for establishing automated IT Service Management Systems
SOA framework
o Management of Service Management tool Foundation data Configuration, process
embedding, integration of multivendor tool sets and upgrades
o Design, development, implementation and improvement of Data Warehouses and
associated presentation layers
 ITSMS Continual Service Improvement Program Design and Implementation
o Implementing the ITIL CSI book to establish formal Service Improvement Programs
o Using Quality Management Tools and techniques for collaborative continual
improvement
The services listed above are provided using flexible methodology that is optimised to provide
acceptable levels of Total Cost of Ownership while ensuring quality of delivery.
We excel in working collaboratively with your internal staff to create custom built IT Service
Management Systems that deliver valuable outcomes to your customers.
Our Resource pool includes
- Transformation Architects and Subject Matter Experts
- Competency Development Specialists
- Tool Architects
- Program Management Resources
- Technical Support Resources (Onsite and Offsite)
For Further details contact: sukumard@actionresearchfoundation.com
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