Press Releases
View All Press Releases| Axios Systems | 11 Feb 2010 |
A third of organisations state ‘defining and designing’ their services, as the biggest challenge in setting up a Service Catalogue
United Kingdom, 26th January, 2010 – Axios Systems, the world’s leading provider of IT Service Management (ITSM) solutions, including the assyst software, today reveals further results of a recent global survey that details the main challenge organisations find, or expect to find, with a Service Catalogue project is the defining and designing of their services.
Axios recently revealed that 64 per cent of organisations are implementing or looking to implement a Service Catalogue in the next 6 months and with this type of project, although there are definite benefits, there are also some challenges that need to be overcome.
When asked about the challenges that organisations had faced, or expected to face, with a Service Catalogue project, 36% of respondents considered the task of defining and designing their services as the biggest hurdle.
Ailsa Symeonides, Sales & Marketing Director at Axios Systems, says, “A tool, such as the assyst Service Designer within the assyst Service Catalogue, enables organisations to intuitively design services using a pre-defined template library, which can be used for all business departments including IT, HR and Facilities Management. Since the assyst Service Catalogue fully integrates with the CMDB it helps organisations achieve end-to-end lifecycle management of services.”
The second biggest challenge for IT, with 20% of respondents agreeing, is changing their approach and mindset to look at services in a non-technical way. It is essential that IT does this in order to provide the services on offer in a way that appeals to all customers, who may have a variety of needs. If customers do not understand the services on offer, and if the Catalogue is not user-friendly, this may risk poor buy-in of the Service Catalogue.
In a recent white paper, Sharon Taylor, ITIL V3 Chief Architect, says, “How the service is depicted in the Service Catalogue carries a major significance for appealing to customer needs. This will not only please existing customers but may be the reason new customers are attracted to you as a service provider!”
Although each project will have its challenges, the benefits that can be achieved from the implementation are far greater. Almost half (44%) of survey respondents expected the biggest benefit of a Service Catalogue to be the improvement in management of services and 35% felt the clarity of the services provided to the customers was another advantage.
Sharon continues, “The validity and usefulness of the Service Catalogue relies on a solid foundation of information and management. Having a well structured and functioning Service Catalogue can link business needs directly to IT services and then into the technical infrastructure. This improves the awareness, understanding and positive cultural behaviours that make effective Service Value Management possible.”
The study was conducted in November and December 2009 and is based on over 1200 IT professionals from North America, Europe and Asia.
