IT Service Manager: The Hero of 2020

The year 2015 may be easily called the year of Cloud Computing. That was the year when Cloud Computing models rose to free software and platform infrastructure with sustainable business models and with tested mechanisms from cloud and service providers.

Cloud Computing models fulfill the world with more than computing power, far away from the almost unlimited capacity. The world learned a new way of doing new business models, offering the world as a Service, Infrastructure as a Service, Platform as a Service, Software as a Service, Storage as a Service, even Blockchain as a Service. For the IT experts, the concept also goes to Everything-as-a-Service (identified as XaaS).

I think this is the smallest scope for Everything as a Service. After Cloud Computing’s irruption into the business, everything has changed. We cannot be as selfish to believe that it only matters to IT since IT forms the core part of the business now.

In the move to the third platform of technology in the following years, the market will find an “Everything-as-a-Service” offer. This will give flexibility to all kinds of business models. Companies will either outsource core services or supporting services, and of course, providers will become service providers.

Gartner forecasts Worldwide Public Cloud Service Revenue is likely to grow 21.4 percent in 2018 compared to the previous year. This may continue growing to almost 60 percent for 2020. This means that companies are moving their “everything” to a cloud model, but more than that, they are moving their business models to as a service model.

(In billions of US dollars)

ITSM Heroes

In my opinion, the world is slowly moving to an Everything as a Service model based on technologies like Cloud Computing, Internet of Things, Big Data, Mobility, Machine Learning, and Blockchain. Gradually, the world will also need expert professionals who are able to lead and manage the whole platform change.

Everything-as-a-Service will give flexibility to all kinds of business models

Every time, a new technology emerges or a new way of doing things start to drive change. One of the first activities is to prepare, educate, and train people to overcome the new paradigm.

ITSM professionals who have more than 30 years of experience knew this business from the past, the science of converting products into sustainable services and we can now confidently call them as ITSM experts. We are currently in a really strange situation when we are facing a major change because the normal is to face new situations with low knowledge.

Service Management Frameworks for Business

It was the year 2007, I was teaching ISO 20000 for the IT personnel of a hospital in the North of Spain. The classroom was on the second floor near the Quality department. During the class, while reviewing the processes one consultant made a parallelism from servicing IT to servicing in the health industry and specifically within the hospital. He asked if ISO 20000 should be used to support health services.

At that moment, the application of the concepts and methods within the norm to the health sector was perfectly viable and may be applied to any other service model. Of course, I admitted I know nothing from the health industry, and I placed my doubt of applying an IT system to the main governing business model. I never forgot that experience. I am now sure we can rescue the experience from ITSM experts to help the business not only to adapt to a “Business as a Service” model, but also support it through technology, and with technology as the core.

New managers need help from Service Managers & ITSM experts for formulating a service model which may be a key task in the Digital Transformation journey. But remember, this is also a technological matter.

Before anything else, you need to:

1. Realize the great opportunity that this global change brings. Adopt a model to measure its impact in your industry.
2. Update your knowledge on ITSM frameworks, best practices and methods. Any method older than 5 years will need to adapt, it does not necessarily mean obsolete. This means you will need to adapt to new technologies, especially to disruptive technologies. And yeah, Agile too!
3. Review the Service Strategy plan, capacity plan, and continuity plan.
4. Move from an IT mentality to a Business mentality.
5. Start helping everyone in the company to understand and adapt to a service culture.