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Misunderstood and Misused - A Rant About Problem Management

By Donna Knapp It’s interesting to see how members of different communities can view a practice so differently. That is currently the case with problem management, the practice of identifying, removing, or mitigating the cause or contributing factors to service disruptions. For the most part, the IT service management (ITSM) community recognizes the value of problem management. They may admittedly struggle to find the time or resources needed to perform the practice. Or they may find it difficult to justify the actions needed to introduce permanent solutions identified as a result of the practice. But they, for the most part, value the practice. Conversely, some members of the DevOps community view problem management, or more specifically, root cause analysis, as a complete waste of time. We’ve found that there are a few common reasons that on the surface make sense, but that have counterpoints worth considering. One reason for the pushback is that the practice of root cause analysis i

Focusing on the Fundamentals

By Donna Knapp Have you ever done business with an organization that liked to brag about all the extras that it provides, but doesn’t get the basics right? To some extent, the accelerated innovation that was sparked by the pandemic fueled this need to focus on the new and shiny. And for some organizations, it is what’s needed to stand out in the crowd, or to compete, or simply to survive. But here is what we know. All the new and shiny in the world can’t make up for a poor customer experience. You cannot sacrifice quality for speed. And a perk here and there can’t overcome the lack of trust that builds up when an organization fails to get the basics right day in and day out. So, what we’ve got to do is strike a balance. A feat that is easier said than done. According to the 2022 State of CIO report, 76% of CIOs say that it’s challenging to find the right balance between business innovation and operational excellence. And yet it is exactly what organizations today need to do… C. All of

Franny (the Festive) Flamingo

Guest host post by Lisa Schwartz It is time to get back to sponsoring tradeshows!  And here at ITSM Academy that means our mascot,  Franny the Flamingo  ( click to read her origin story ) is going to Las Vegas. She's been with us at every conference since the early 2000s and I am sure she is ready to hit the road, via my suitcase, to represent again.  And her moment is here. We just signed as a sponsor of #Pink23. It was an easy decision, year-over-year, the conference is awesome.  This year, one of the options is to host, and name, the Signature Drink. During the February conference, Franny will be celebrating her 19th birthday - the Canadian legal drinking age.  It seemed fitting to honor her contribution to ITSM Academy by calling the #Pink23 Signature Drink the Festive Flamingo . That way, everyone attending can join Franny’s birthday bash.  #flamingoals   As it happens, @ITSMDonna is also celebrating her birthday in February and we take birthdays very seriously - paid holiday

Filling the Process and Framework Skills Gap

By Donna Knapp For many organizations, the COVID-19 pandemic exposed one of two ends of a spectrum: poorly defined processes, or overly-rigorous processes. At either end of the spectrum, these organizations likely struggled to adapt as the pandemic impacted our lives. For those with poorly defined processes, things were probably pretty chaotic. For those with overly-rigorous processes, things were most certainly taking way too long. Even organizations with well-defined processes felt, and continue to feel, pressure to speed up the flow of work, minimize toil, and automate processes where possible. To do this, they must develop a culture of continuous improvement and learning. Continuous improvement is an ongoing effort to improve all aspects of an organization; its people, processes, tools, products, services, and experiences… all of which are tightly integrated. Whether improvements are large or small, what matters most is that they are constant. The highest performing organizations a

We are the World Leader for Value Stream Mapping?

Recently, I am hearing things like  “We are the World Leader for Value Stream Mapping”   from vendors and managed service providers alike.  Why? I thought. Value Stream Mapping (VSM) was originally introduced in 1996.  Why is this becoming such a hot item again now?   Other tag lines and mantras that you are likely to hear are things like:      Experience Management is an Evolution Speed to Value not Time to Market Without continuous flow, continuous integration               Continuous Delivery are just an aspire! From Milestones To a Continuous Quality Assurance Flow Shift Left, and    Green to Green Every IT executive, manager, or practitioner can surely add to this list. I thought about these and other new ways of thinking and realized we are moving beyond Digital Transformations and understood that true success for any delivery cycle will require Flow Engineering. Without continuous flow service providers are likely not going to be able to meet business and customer requirements

ITIL® 4 Roundup

I'm working with some of the ITSM Academy folks today, and I realized just how many "assets" they have for you around ITIL 4 ( as well as #Agile #DevOps #XLA #VSM #SRE and #ITSM) .  As Lisa and team always say, "Not ready for training just yet? Please use us as your resource." So I want to do a quick recap of some of the assets available to you, before (and after!) you become Academy Alumni... BLOGS: This one is a little self-serving, but there are TONS of blogs on here - since 2019 all of the ITIL blog posts have been about ITIL 4 - ðŸ¦©  LINK  ðŸ¦© POST: A business strategy, a digital strategy and an IT strategy walk into the bar and… Oh, wait they can't because of COVID-19. Now what? 🦩  LINK  ðŸ¦© WEBINARS: Since 2007, the Academy has hosted monthly “no selling allowed” webinars 🦩  See Archive  ðŸ¦© ITIL 4 GUIDING PRINCIPLES POSTER: And the best part, they made it small enough to print for your home office! 🦩  LINK  ðŸ¦©  WHATIS...?: So the ladies got Serious wi

Sustainability and Resilience: What the World Needs Now

By Donna Knapp Look around and it’s likely that many of the organizations that you do business with, and perhaps the company that you work for (or want to work for), are demonstrating a commitment to sustainability. Sustainability has become a top priority for CEOs but what is it? In 1987, the United Nations (UN) defined sustainability as “meeting the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs.”   Sustainability is not just environmentalism, although that is an aspect of it. Sustainability is a set of values that are shared by individuals and organizations worldwide who demonstrate their commitment to these values every day through their decisions and actions. Embedded in sustainability we also find concerns for social equity and economic development, as illustrated by the UN’s 17 sustainable development goals . In recent years much of corporate America, including many large multinationals, has signed on to support the sustainabl