Right now my department is looking to find a replacement for its current ITSM tool.  What I’ve noticed is that a lot of the tools out there are showing off “quick step” or “single step” functionality.  These hot new features make life a lot easier as they take common tasks and integrate the results into records.  For example, a common Service Desk trouble-shooting step is to ping the workstation and post the results in the Incident Record.  With a “quick step,” they could simply type in the workstation name and click on a single button that would automatically ping the workstation and attach the results to the record.  There are even such technologies that can automatically attach a screen shot of the remote workstation.  This is fantastic…in the short term.  I believe in being neutral when it comes to products, but one tool I love is Service-Now.  It has no such “quick step” features, but where it shines above all the rest is it’s long-term support of ITIL.  It does a magnificent job in tying all of the ITIL v3 processes together with an easy to use interface that gives everyone, and I mean practically everyone, the ability to easily make dashboards and view the current state of the I.T. environment.  The kinds of organizations that Service-Now really can market to are those that seriously want a tool to help with processes and managing the I.T. infrastructure, not just something that’s used for record tracking.  Now, is my organization ready for a tool that’s so highly aligned with ITIL?  Probably not.  Right now, just like any other growing company in today’s economy, we’re looking for ways to work more efficiently without having to hire more people.  The various tools with “quick steps” will help decrease Incident Resolution time, increase First Call Resolution rates and will (hopefully) provide a very friendly and intuitive self-service portal for Request Management and Knowledge Management.  Will it support changes in Processes?  Yes.  Will it be perfectly aligned to ITIL?  Probably not.  But right now my department is evolving and using a tool better suited for long-term goals won’t help us meet our short-term or mid-term ones.

avatar

Started working in IT in 1999 as a support desk analyst as a way to help pay for food during college. Studied Electrical Engineering for two years before realizing biochemistry was more fun than differential equations, and so ultimately graduated with a Biology degree in 2006. Having (reluctantly) failed at getting accepted into dental school, embraced working in IT and has gone broke becoming an ITIL Expert. Likes to jog, sing camp songs, quote Mel Brooks movie lines and make dumb jokes and loves working for an Israeli tech company where December 25th is a regular work day.