A Practical Approach to Service Portfolio Management

CA World 2010

Abstract

» Are you still attempting to make improvements in a piece meal fashion because you don’t think you have the time or the resources to take on something that has the “transformational?” Attend this session and see how three key best-practice frameworks can be integrated in a practical manner so that you can govern investments across your enterprise and manage them to maximum value.

» Project Portfolio Management, IT Service Management and IT Asset Management Lifecycle (ITAM) frameworks exist to provide cost efficiency, improve service delivery and to help you to achieve your organizational goals. Each of these frameworks can improve processes and productivity independently, but when elements are combined they are able to deliver exponentially more value. Presenters will discuss how to align engagement between IT and the business at key points such as corporate planning, request management and resource management, how to simultaneously drive cost efficiency while improving service, all while utilizing an approach that delivers value in 3 to 6 months.

2

Biography

» Paul L. Wheaton, Portfolio Director

Acquity Group, Business and Technology Enablement Practice

» Mr. Wheaton has 20 years of experience within the technology industry, including experience managing large professional services practices as well as global business development practices for both professional services firms and software-focused solutions. Prior to joining Acquity Group, Mr. Wheaton served in a variety of managerial roles within Andersen Consulting’s, BDM Technologies’ and Deloitte &Touche LLP’s strategic services consulting practices, as well as executive management roles at Platinum Technology, CA (formerly known as Computer Associates) and Five9 Technologies.

3

Agenda» Objectives for this session

» Background and working definitions

» Limitations of taking the usual silo’d approach

» Practical way to get started

» Questions and Answers

4

Session Objectives

» To describe the most common best practice frameworks (i.e., ITIL, IT Asset Management and Project Portfolio Management) and the value that can be gained by each

» To discuss the limitations of implementing these frameworks in an independent fashion

» To describe an incremental method to align engagement between IT and the business at key points such as corporate planning, demand management, resource management, etc.

5

6

Today’s Business Environment is Demanding

Transparency Accountability Clear Communications

» Today’s business climate places pressure on organizations to be much more fiscally responsible, increasingly more efficient, and above all more effective.

Fiscal Responsibility Efficiency Effectiveness

» Business-facing leaders are searching for trustworthy partners who can help unite strategy with governance and performance – empowering them to at least meet, if not exceed, increased demands with an accelerated rate of change.

» Executive stakeholders now demand transparency into spending, operations and the decision making process. This increased scrutiny and visibility holds everyone much more accountable.

7

How often do you hear?

What does that mean?

Why do you have to do that stuff first?

Why is it taking so long?

What did we actually get for the money we spent?

How does that help us?

Why does this stuff always cost so much?

Why didn’t you tell me we had a problem?

Do you know the answers?

What does it mean to manage for business value?

» It means that you :

» Understand how high-value business services are defined and measured

» Align IT services and resources to core business services

» Measure those IT services – both from quality of service and cost perspectives – in comparable manners to the business service

» Communicate cost and performance regularly with business counterparts, using business terms that they understand

So why is it so difficult?

8

Challenges often faced:

» Difficult to understand demand when it’s neither visible nor aligned

» Multiple ways to request IT services

» Not all demand is captured, or at least captured in a consistent fashion

» Demand for IT services unlikely to be correlated to accompanying business service

» Information related to cost, quality, and business purpose is often:

» Fragmented across the enterprise

» Partially complete

» Even if the legacy systems and/or processes contained the data, it’s unlikely that it’s organized in terms that your business counterparts understand

9

So what do people usually try?

10

10

Service Operation and Transition as a starting point

11

Most people start with Service

Operation and Transition

processes to alleviate

operational issues

Most people start with Service

Operation and Transition

processes to alleviate

operational issues

Then they might start to add

repeatable IT services via a

Service Catalog and measure their Service

Levels

Then they might start to add

repeatable IT services via a

Service Catalog and measure their Service

Levels

Problem 1: What is the

Business context for

these services?

Problem 1: What is the

Business context for

these services?

Problem 3: What are ALL

the assets that support my

Business Services?

Problem 3: What are ALL

the assets that support my

Business Services?

Problem 2: How do I measure

demand for my Business Services?

Problem 2: How do I measure

demand for my Business Services?

ITAM helps, too…

» ITAM manages the financial aspects of IT assets which:

» Provides the ability to manage contracts, including software license compliance. hardware maintenance contracts and 3rd party vendor contracts

» Enables IT to understand where IT Assets are located, the status of that Asset and how they are being utilized over time

» Controls and can enable the reduction of asset shrinkage

» Enables the mitigation and reduction of Regulatory and Financial Risk through standardization, proper documentation, loss detection

12

ITAM helps, too…

13

but only up to a point

ITAM Gaps» IT Services and/or Projects are

often not associated with the correlated IT Assets that have been deployed

» ITAM efforts often don’t consider the cost to deploy or retire an asset, meaning you get an incomplete cost picture

» ITAM efforts don’t focus on other related costs, such as staffing

» No real inherent tie to underlying Business Services

PPM is crucial…

» Project Portfolio Management is a continuous process by which:

» Management prioritizes demand» Plans and allocates resources to

preferred investment initiatives» Manages portfolio governance-

orientated collaboration with stakeholders

» Delivers expected results from the investment

» Provides reporting to stakeholders for decision-making and the communication of investment status

14

PPM is crucial…but has its limits

15

PPM Gaps» Focuses on project-related

costs and activities; typically does not consider ongoing costs

» Often focuses on human resources, but not other related resources (e.g., ITAM resources)

» Often does not tie directly to IT Services and/or underlying Business Services

It really needs to fit together in a broader context…

16

Do you really know what your overall

demand is?

How do your plans support your most important Business Services?

How do you know you’re picking the

most important initiatives?

Are you flexible enough to accommodate new

requests?

How do you ensure consistency when

and where it’s needed?

ITIL v3 Service Portfolio Definition

» The complete set of Services that are managed by a Service Provider. The Service Portfolio is used to manage the entire Lifecycle of all Services

» The Service Portfolio includes three Categories:

» Service Pipeline (proposed or in Development)

» Service Catalogue (Live or available for Deployment) and

» Retired Services

17

A very IT-centric view of the world

So what is Service Portfolio Management?

» Gartner defines IT Service Portfolio Management as:

» Documenting the service portfolio of standardized IT services

» Decomposing those service "offerings" into an actionable service catalog of specific service request items including pricing and service level objectives

» Automating the fulfillment of service requests and approvals

» Reporting on service request actuals vs. forecasts, service delivery, service level performance and service financial management

18

    *Gartner research note IDG00150537 10Sept2007

…but you still need the BUSINESS context…

Service Portfolio as a Context for Communication

“We spent $575M on IT last year”

“The A/R system never went down last month”

What IT Says:What IT Says: What Business Says:What Business Says:

“We really don’t know how much it costs us to process a claim”

“We need to spend more time in front of our customers”

“We’re taking too long to underwrite policies”

“Our servers were up 99.5% of the time”

Services BridgeServices Bridge

Customer Relationship Service

Customer Relationship Service

Policy Underwriting Service

Policy Underwriting Service

Customer Claim Service

Customer Claim Service

So what does this start to look like?

20

20

Our context revisited

21

How do you look at Business Value?

22

Service Function•Functional description•Supporting processes

Service Quality•Performance metrics•Service availability

Service Cost•Instantiate•Operate•Recover

Service Outcome•Initiatives•KPIs

Key Value Dimensions

Service Lifecycle

Examining Services from a Value Perspective…

23

» We usually start with a select set of primary business services to enable

» Selected based on opportunity, heightened priority, pain, anticipated or planned changes, etc.

» Different business services may be enabled by different groups, but we each do it with a similar set of goals in mind

24

Business and IT Services

So what does this offer?

» This approach allows you to:

» Manage the related cost and performance detail in business value context

» Communicate back to the business with terms that they understand

» Align investment decisions directly to business contributions

25

Paul Wheaton, Portfolio Director (312) 427-2220  | paul.wheaton@acquitygroup.com