IT organization service delivery must insure that their objectives are in line with business objectives. What is important to the business. IT must insure that the core of its service delivery strategy are the key components of what is important to the business? The IT organization must continually seek to understand and align its activities with business needs.  In this way IT will continue to add value to the business by stayingin synch with business needs.

Can u pls suggest me an ITSM tool which can u used to track all IT service management activities on day to day basis ,capture SLA (OLA ‘s Set by the organistaion ),All Management reports (trend analysis,Process behaviour charts ),Effort capture ,Work load analysis .

I am looking for a SM tool for my organistion so that it can adapt to ITIL Life cycle model /cmmi for Services model .

Also when you suggest me a tool also pls give me an insight on whom to and how to contact the concerned parties to incorporate that particular tool in my organisation .

Manfred is a big proponent of using software metrics properly to evaluate organizations. In his words:

Measurement can be a double-edged sword. It can save money and time, or it can cause damage to an organization. Organizations that border on a culture of malpractice will use numbers and statistics to say anything they want. On the other hand, the best performers tend to utilize their software metrics data properly. Read More>>

He readily admits that there are over a thousand different metrics that can be used to evaluate an organization, and that the tools for executing measurement, while not as numerous, are just as varied. He provides a lot of questions an organizations can use to determine what metrics they should collect based on their situation. He examines four reasons why metrics programs fail. He makes the point that:

 “The fact is, organizations have no idea how inefficient and unproductive they are. They do not take the time or effort to learn about best practices. As a result, they continue to operate in the dark; uninformed of all the various methods that could be having a positive impact on their business.” Read More>>

And we agree. What are your thoughts on the importance of appropriate metrics in evaluating whether an organization has selected the very best practices?

We do use Trend Charts for various process areas (Service Requests, Incident, Problem and Change).

Chris Curran, in his article “10 Metrics for a New CIO,” argues that just a tenth of the numbers are necessary. He lists the following ten numbers, with explanations you can read in the article.

1. Multi-year view on productivity, something like (Discretionary IT Spend)/(Total IT Headcount).  This could normalized it with some factor for “effective” discretionary spend assuming all projects are not 100% effective.
2. Percentage of discretionary spend categorized by type
3. Number of bug fixes and enhancement requests for top 20 systems
4. Average hours/days to close critical/high support issues
5. Percentage of projects using enterprise hardware and software standards
6. Number of hours/days of training per person/team/area
7. Number of projects in each phase of the SDLC and average times in each stage (view of overall project pipeline, identify bottlenecks, etc.)
8. Some kind of customer/user measure if the company has any customers using an online channel
9. Percentage of projects who deliver 100% of their planned scope or percent of scope delivered
10. Core application availability (not technical SLA stuff, rather apps availability when users need it)

His last statement we’re not sure we agree with. We agree with Chris that customer satisfaction is an important measure. Where we disagree is when he states that, aside from a general survey, he hasn’t seen anything useful. Our Managed Maintenance Application Support Process has a wonderful five-question form that gives the user room to expand on the assigned numbers for each question.

What are your thoughts on these metrics compared to the last ones we published? Are they simpler and more useful for your line of business? We encourage you to discuss your thoughts on our blog.

Nick Spanos explores this question in his article on “100 IT Performance Metrics.” He begins by stating that the goal of any IT organization is “to provide an information processing capability that benefits the business.” He continues by stating:

“One hundred data elements is more than a typical CIO would review. The CIO’s management team should be tracking and managing to these metrics. The highlighted metrics should be reviewed by a CIO on a regular basis.” Read More>>

He then lists in tabular form (for many pages) the top 100 measures he believes should be employed and whether they are a number or a graphical display. You’ll want to review each measure closely and come back to the blog ready to make your case for your favorite metrics.

In the article, “IT Service Management Can Ease Cloud Transition,” the issues surrounding IT departments and the move to cloud computing are explored. There is some question about what roles will be played by internal resources and what roles will be played by offshore resources. Even the very function of an IT department is in question about how it will metamorphasize in this new environment. How can these shifts in role, purpose, and thought be made easier for IT resources?

According to the article:

This shift could provide a boost for the IT Infrastructure Library (ITIL) and other IT service management methodologies. …One of ITIL’s key recommendations is establishing a service catalog, which should make it easier to determine which internal services are good candidates for migration to the cloud and help ensure a smooth transition for those that are selected. Read More>>

Have you been affected by cloud computing? Has anyone in your organization tried to apply ITIL’s service management methodologies to this radical shift in thinking? We invite you to share your experiences with us on our blog.