M&A driving global enterprise adoption of ITIL: Datamonitor

Mumbai: M&A is the principal catalyst driving enterprise ITIL-based implementations forward This is revealed from results of research undertaken by London-based market analyst Datamonitor on global enterprise adoption of ITIL (IT infrastructure library) initiatives.

Datamonitor's CIO Agenda MarketWatch conducted an in depth study of ITIL adoption to chart best practices and lessons learned.

M&A emerged as the principal catalyst driving ITIL adoption. When corporate restructuring occurred in the wake of M&A, process change became inevitable. As the public face of IT, service management was considered a reachable place to start. Datamonitor also discovered close alignment between ITIL and COBIT, another framework that is aimed at cultivating more effective IT governance practices.

Furthermore, while so-called reengineering projects have lost favour because of their disruptive impacts and loose scope, Datamonitor found that ITIL projects require nothing short of process reengineering.

The study also revealed that ITIL adopters have only partially learned how to avoid the pitfalls of traditional reengineering. Not surprisingly, one of the chief hurdles was maintaining firm control of project scope. This is especially critical when compiling the change and configuration management database (CMDB) that is pivotal to ITIL adoption.

Another was maintaining a delicate balance between securing the level of top management commitment to gain mind share, while avoiding the pitfalls of top-down initiatives that fail to set realistic goals or secure grassroots buy-in.

One approach for gaining bottom-up support was developing a career ladder that can help service desk professionals better compete with emerging resources offshore, while opening opportunities to advance to operational management positions. However, given that service desk is typically considered an entry level position with an average turnover of 12 - 18 months career ladder development remains challenging.

Overall, organisations that have successfully embraced ITIL have discovered follow-on process improvements that bolstered business agility and boosted the quality of IT service delivery.

Datamonitor's CIO Agenda MarketWatch study uncovered several surprises. For instance, while regulatory compliance has been cited as instigator of numerous IT reengineering projects, in this sample, it proved only a minor factor. Furthermore, while much attention has been directed to the importance of documenting ROI (return on investment) to green light IT initiatives, it was only a minor factor here.

"ITIL initiatives are the moral equivalent of reengineering," notes Tony Baer, principal analyst for CIO Agenda at Datamonitor. "While IT has never had a good track record in the past for maintaining project scope and timely delivery, ITIL offers a rare opportunity for redemption."

ITIL has focused the spotlight on an area long neglected by IT: service management and delivery. Traditionally, most organisations relegated "help desks" as low priority budget line items because it has been perceived as an overhead cost that contributed little business benefit. Yet, ITIL became one of the first major IT initiatives that actually emerged in the aftermath of the dot com-Post Y2K-9/11 perfect storm.

ITIL is a series of reports used to aid the implementation of a framework for IT service management. Developed in recognition of organisations' growing dependency on IT to satisfy corporate aims and meet business needs, ITIL embodies best practices for IT service management. Developed under the auspices of the UK Office of Government Commerce (OGC), widespread adoption of the ITIL guidance has encouraged organisations worldwide, both commercial and public-sector organizations, to develop best practice approaches.