Improving service
The government of Ontario, Canada, also embraced ITIL. Ontario needed to improve service to its 25,000 users at 1000 locations. By adopting ITIL, the government created a virtual service desk that not only improved response time and reduced trouble tickets but also decreased support costs by 40 percent.
CobiT has its share of success stories as well. The state of Kansas uses CobiT standards as part of its virtual government strategy to keep costs low and deliver consistent service to its customers and constituents. Dell Computer includes CobiT best practices as part of its Control Self Assessment (CSA) corporate policy, a set of auditing checks and balances that helps the company maintain its high quality.
Establishing IT governance
These impressive results from well-respected organisations are clear indicators that IT governance can pay off. But sometimes starting can be the toughest step to take. Here are three tips on proceeding with IT governance:
- Focus on the biggest weaknesses. Implementing the entire ITIL or CobiT model would be overwhelming for any IT shop. Instead, start with the biggest pain point. For example, if your IT organisation is having trouble supporting a large distributed organisation, do what Ontario did and execute the ITIL help-desk processes. Work through the training, organizational changes, and implementation challenges in one area as a learning experience, then move on to other problem areas. Remember to benchmark the current environment before you begin the IT governance effort so you can measure progress over time.
- Get buy-in from executive management and the IT staff. Although IT governance is designed to improve efficiency and business responsiveness, it does involve some formal process changes that may introduce formality and friction in the organisation. Senior executives must lead the transition by rallying the company and communicating that any short-term changes are an investment for long-term benefits for the entire organisation. The CIO must get the troops behind the effort through compensation changes, where IT bonuses are based on overall metric improvements and budget reductions. Once IT governance standards are in place, experts say you can expect to see positive results in six months.
- Reach out for help. ITIL best practice volumes cost only US$90 to US$150 each, and they're worthwhile to seek out help with baselining, training, and process creation. Hewlett-Packard has a long history of ITIL excellence, while IBM Global Services has also established an IT governance practice. Local specialists such as Pink Elephant in Canada and Treadstone71 in New England are also IT governance experts.
Start now on the path to big rewards
CIOs can't continue to try to maintain the status quo when they are on the hook to improve results while decreasing staff and overall spending.
IT governance standards such as ITIL and CobiT obviously can help lower costs while improving service. Proctor & Gamble, the government of Ontario, the state of Kansas, and Dell Computer, and others have seen measurable improvements by establishing IT governance. That's why CIOs should start small and grow, get corporate and IT buy-in, and find service partners to start the governance process.
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