Implementing ITIL within your current business or organisation will give you the edge or advantage when it comes to the delivery of long term services for your internal and external customers. However, implementing ITIL needs dedication and a large amount of effort from everyone involved if it is to be a success. Many people have no idea where to start with the implementation of ITIL.
Use The Right People For Implementing ITIL
The first step is to agree on the goals of the implementation and what outcomes are expected. It is important to involve key personnel and ensure that everyone has at least a basic understanding of ITIL practices. Without having the correct people in place and on side before you start, the foundations of your implementation will be shaky.
The old saying “knowledge is power” is still true when organising any IT or ITSM project within an organization. If you have any contacts with other companies who have already been through a similar process, use those links and relationships to build your own view of best practice. Knowledge should also extend up the management tree as far as possible, ensuring that they know what ITIL is, why it works and what they will get out of supporting it from the get go. There is nothing worse than having someone who blocks change within an organisation just because they don’t understand it. Therefore, choosing the right people to run an implementing ITIL leadership team is also a critical task to ensuring success.
Make sure you choose people who have a proven track record of such things and carry some respect too. With a powerful, knowledgeable team at the helm, who support and evangelise the new ITIL processes, the project will be off to a great start. Make sure that any people on this team who need it, get the relevant training or books before hand. Once they have that knowledge, they will then be able to effectively cascade down to their teams the purpose and benefits of ITIL.
Once you have the team ready to manage the implementation, you will need another group that are capable of managing the change throughout the organization. These people should feel that they are owning the process for their areas of responsibility and are therefore accountable for the success of bringing in ITIL. These people are critical because they know where the processes they are responsible for fit in with the “big picture” and goals of the organization. They will know how the new ITIL processes will fit over their current practices.
Implementing ITIL Requires A Framework Approach
Next comes the framework that is used to measure the success of the project. This begins with the evaluation of any existing processes, ensuring that all facets are recorded and known. This is a great time to identify any areas that need to be addressed, grey areas, weak spots or complete gaps. You can also start to think how they can be changed for the better. By defining goals and measuring where the current situation is in respect to these, will help track the implementation of ITIL.
The next step will be to identify and create steps to allow these goals to be achieved. Throughout the implementation, communication of the prior and current evaluations of the goals should be done by the teams to all key members of staff. This information should be discussed by all relevant staff and any important factors noted. From these discussions, an action plan can be built. The plan should contain a list of the existing IT services currently offered by your company. Against each of these services and processes, a workshop should be undertaken to ensure that they are fully understood and key implementation staff should be identified who can be responsible for certain areas.
Without all parties, sections, departments and staff working together and being integrated prior to implementing ITIL is key to it’s success.
