What is eTOM?

Hello,

Since graduating from University in 1997; I have worked on projects across a number of industry verticals; I found the telecommunications sector to be one of the most interesting. Perhaps this is due to the extremely complex underlying technologies that operate under the bonnet. But what is it that has helped the industry plan and deliver well? 

I believe a key enabler and no doubt there are others alongside this has been the development and implementation of the eTOM framework. Let me go over this a bit within this article. 

There is a bit of history where the telecom industry was in a somewhat chaotic state during the transition from being an engineering-oriented discipline during the early eighties to a more mature business and customer-oriented discipline with the passing of time. A dearth of a pervasive yet integrated approach to define the DNA of this sector was identified. Another realisation was the pivotal role of processes within such complex organisations. There needed to be an agreed-upon approach for capturing processes across the entire enterprise in a holistic and integrated manner.

The TeleManagement Forum (www.tmforum.org) based out of England with its background in service management and processes was at the right place at the right time and hence spearheaded this effort to develop what ultimately became eTOM (the "enhanced Telecommunications Operations Map"). It has now become a globally accepted best practice for telecom operators as well as other players in this service provider space. Since its launch in 2001, eTOM continues to grow and adapt to changes in order to stay abreast of research and continue to deliver value to implementing organisations.

eTOM provided a standard approach and common language due to which all parties could align with; operators, suppliers, application developers and technology providers; eTOM provided an operating model and reference point against which both functionality and interoperability would now be established. Let us look a little further into this model.

Image Source: https://bit.ly/2z3Jb2X

The figure above depicts the Level 0 "Conceptual" view of eTOM which in effect breaks down the enterprise into 3 process groups as follows:

1. Strategy, Infrastructure & Product: This covers strategy, planning, product design, analysing the supply chain and related areas
2. Operations: This is where eTOM has the most emphasis and value; all of the day-to-day running processes including the FAB (Fulfillment, Assurance and Billing) processes
3. Enterprise Management: All of the general corporate processes such as HR, Finance etc. that exist in all organisations; you can say those non-telecom operator areas of the business.

The Customer is placed at the top of the diagram as the beneficiary and recipient of all process work carried out. At the bottom of the diagram are the internal entities who carry out many of the tasks or who have a vested interest in how well Operations works. The Suppliers/Partners bubble just above Enterprise Management refers to external entities with whom the service provider will need to have legally binding agreements and SLAs. 

The horizontal domains, e.g. Market, Product and Customer represent key functional areas which span across the organisation internally.

Image Source: https://bit.ly/3fZrK49

The above figure represents Level 1 of eTOM; this level introduces 8 vertical process  categories which represent an end-to-end process, e.g. Billing. If functional linkages need to be analysed, then the horizontal process groups are referred to instead.

Image Source: https://bit.ly/2zTdbhQ

The above figure then presents the next stage of decomposition; that of Level 2. Each of the white boxes sits at an intersection of the vertical with horizontal process groupings, e.g. Service Configuration and Activation. At this level, its one and the same process whether being viewed from a vertical or horizontal perspective.

Following is an overview of the process groupings in this area:

1. Strategy and Commit encompasses processes related to the enterprises's strategic positioning and planning as well as gaining commitment from the business to support these priorities. The scope is at all levels; market, customer, products, resources as well as the supply chain.
2. Infrastructure Lifecycle Management is concerned with the planning and implementation of the application, computing and network infrastructures to ensure these capabilities meet current and future business and product requirements.
3. Product Lifecycle Management manages the product portfolio and catalogues through the lifecycle of the product; ensuring products meet both cost and quality imperatives.
4. Marketing and Offer Management; the first of the horizontal groupings here considers areas such as the sales channels, product marketing, pricing and marketing communication.
5. Service Development & Management covers all service related activities thereby ensuring that all services delivered meet requirements of Operations, enabling Operations to meet the needs of the customers effectively.
6. Resource Development & Management takes care of the network, physical and non-physical resources ensuring that the right planning, design and deployment is in place so they can support services and products in the Operations domain as per the requirements.
7. Supply Chain Development & Management looks at selection of suppliers and partners such that their delivery can aid innovation and deliver superior support. Supplier agreements and their performance measurement is covered here also.

Let us take a brief look at the Operations area; this represents no doubt the core of eTOM and where it has the most focus and maturity. The groupings are as follows:

1. Operations Support & Readiness provides management, administrative and logistical support to the subsequent 3 processes of Fulfillment, Assurance and Billing (FAB). Furthermore; FAB executes direct customer facing processes and those which are more in the background are placed here.
2. Fulfillment processes orders in a timely manner meeting customer expectations. It matches what the customer requests with the product catalogues and gives real time updates on progress with order execution. It ensures the customer is pleased with the overall request and provisioning process until closure.
3. Assurance looks at quality and performance proactively and reactively in a way that SLAs and quality metrics are setup and being monitored for adherence. It strives to identify and eliminate root causes of failure and where they occur to focus on their restoration as quickly as possible.
4. Billing supports both prepaid and postpaid customers so that customers can access what they have paid for or have agreed to pay for. Its process translate usage records and process them to generate accurate bills which are sent to customers on a timely basis. Bill related enquiries and problems are handled by this process grouping.
5. Customer Relationship Management is the first horizontal grouping in his area, taking ownership for all processes related to acquiring, retaining and looking for innovative means making customers more valuable to the enterprise. All channels are analysed to ensure they remain effective. This process group also retains key information on the customer and their buying behaviour in order to influence strategies for marketing and sales.
6. Service Management and Operations which takes care of the services aspect; how services are defined, governed and implemented. The scope here is on services and not the underlying technology.
7. Resource Management and Operations takes care of the underlying technology (application, computing and network) and all of the resources across these domains to ensure that both network and IT resources function and support the services to the requisite level of performance.
8. Supplier/Partner Relationship Management handles the relationship with suppliers and partners; ensuring that agreements are put in place to enable a seamless end-to-end delivery of service and support as well as vendor performance management. These processes also cover procurement activities, track payments and deal with issues as they may arise.

The final area of eTOM have the Enterprise Management cover processes that are not telecom related; however are required by all organisations. Quite often referred to as processes that support corporate functions such as HR, finance, R&D, PR, risk management, legal affairs and the likes of these.

The objective here was to provide an eagle eye's view of eTOM noting that this business process framework has become the defacto approach used by telecom and other leading service provider organisations across the globe. It leverages significant benefits and continues to adapt and mature.

Your feedback always most welcome via email on mail@musab.co.uk. 

Take care and kind regards,

Musab

Business Process Mapping - what to consider...

Dear All... 

When mapping an as-is or to-be business (e.g. marketing or sales processes..) what are the key elements that go into the exercise? Here are some of the most important things I consider. I have recently completed a few process mapping projects; so sharing my view based on experience... It's good to hear from others on what they include (or do not) when embarking upon such efforts... Here is my list: 1) An over-arching Customer Journey with the phases that the person goes through with your organisation (from even before they become an actual customer!) 2) A taxonomy that groups processes against the organisational units 3) The process list 4) The framework/guidelines/template that all processes must follow 5) The end-to-end processes themselves 6) Management reporting - a dashboard with key performance indicators for each level of abstraction adjusted for the intended readership 7) Tool automation requirements (that were captured during workshops and meetings) 8) Controls and methods for good governance
9) Method for managing the organisational change especially during the transition 10) The process and logs for continual improvement... Do share how you go about this within your world. Thank you... Musab Qureshi - mail@musab.co.uk 

Business Processes and their critical role... Musab Qureshi

Hello;


I recently contacted my utility provider to discuss moving addresses... It took over 10 calls and a number of attempted web chat sessions, using up a good 3/4 hours of my extremely precious time over 2 days to get the job done. The job was done well at the end - but this showed a number of "issues", for want of a better word with the underlying business processes themselves. So let me roll up my sleeves and brainstorm some quick questions that come to mind – if I was the manager for business processes within such as organisation – then these are some quick questions that would come to my mind:

• Have my organisation invested well in mapping their business processes properly? Was the customer journey mapped? How successful was this project? Was there a good handover from consultants to incumbent staff before project closure? Were agreed improvements spun off into improvement initiatives and how well is progress being made on these initiatives?
• How well are people being inducted into the change? Are our people being trained and motivated to own, run and be good ambassadors of our processes? Is there good governance and how do we deal with non-compliance?
• Has our technology investment been leveraged well? Is our business and customer prerogative driving our processes and tool – or are tool enthusiasts trying to push the technology beyond its level? Is there visible management support? Is there good ownership locally to drive this long term?
• Have mapped processes been analysed for efficiency, effectiveness reduced risk? Are processes linked end-to-end seamlessly? Is the flow smooth across the paths they flow? Have data requirements been looked at? Is information being captured being effectively used across the process and in different areas as required by process actors? Is the tool full aligned with the process? How “real” is our reporting and business intelligence? Are we able to link statistics with the reality on the ground?
• Have the processes been fully tested from a customer perspective? Were all channels into the business analysed (phone, email, web-form, web-chat, twitter…)? Has a Voice of Customer analysis been made? Is there a way to gauge customer satisfaction? What methods are in place to link customer feedback with continuous improvement? Have people worn the customer “hat” and walked end-to-end through our processes?
• Remember that poor processes are going to make your organisation inefficient, open to risk, frustrated staff, customer dissatisfaction and ultimately loss of revenue. The prudent organisation is pro-active and strives to improve their business processes from the inside out.

Your feedback most welcome via email on mail@musab.co.uk

This article was originally published in March 2019 at https://bit.ly/BizP1

Honoured to be Reviewer of prestigious management publication - Service Level Management and the Service Manager...

It is an honour to have my name as a Reviewer of this prestigious management publication; as published by The Stationary Office (TSO) in the United Kingdom.

The book is itself available from Amazon UK at the following: http://amzn.to/208NaMZ

A preview may be obtained from the following: http://www.inform-it.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/03/SLM-and-the-Service-Manager-SAMPLE-with-intro-small.pdf

My name is there on page 8 of the PDF file download.

To Certify or not to Certify - that is the Question!

Hello,

The world of IT Management has progressed somewhat; from the early days where you probably deserved a medal if you could write workable code on a PDP-11 to the contemporary CIO whose direction can in many cases, influence the corporate strategy.

Over the past few years we have seen a plethora of "certifications" emerge, grow and interestingly enough become a significant factor influencing the hiring of staff who work in technology organisations. Just to name some of these from the IT alphabet soup; we have ITIL, COBIT, PRINCE2, PMP, CCIE, MCSD, CGEIT, TOGAF, Lean Six Sigma; the list goes on.

Here are my recommendations as it pertains to certifications, training and to some degree best practices overall:

• Best practices are a shortcut to improving maturity - Unless if you have an R&D budget that stretches far and wide, you will always benefit from best practices - simply as they are developed sometimes from tens of hundreds of man hours (if not more) of research, trying and testing, mistakes and subsequently, improvement. There are organisations who take the initiative to develop their own intellectual capital (such as Catalyst from Computer Sciences Corporation); however the guidance they develop maintains the use of best practice (such as ITIL) as their baseline. Thereafter they develop products and guidance that is based upon and aligned with the respective best practice. They might develop some of the material into actionable toolkits that ease implementation; however the reference point remains the same.
• The Foundation level mostly suffices - The ITIL Foundation course for the sake of discussion is quite intensive. If you see the amount of material that is covered during a typical three day run; it serves the need for most knowledge workers in IT organisations fairly well. Unless if you are considering a specialised role in a particular area (service management, systems administration, application development, project management etc.), then the foundation level will have a breadth and depth that will in most cases be sufficient for gaining a sound level of proficiency within the respective domain.
• Education is never a lost investment - I often get asked about the real value of certifications. Call me old fashioned if you like, however I hold the firm belief that the widening of your horizons, the chance to improve your lateral thinking... these are all benefits that come from training and education. Bear in mind that it isn't the only indicator - you will always have a shining star who hasn't got the certification collection shelf; nonetheless that doesn't lower the business benefit of certifications to professionals as well as their employers. I have a friend with a Doctorate degree in Biological sciences who is now making remarkable delivery in the world of IT, and also know of an extremely successful professional who transitioned from IT into managing property portfolios. Irrespective of the choices you make for your career, your investment in education and training is always going to spur you forward - and accordingly will spur your organisation forward simultaneously.
• Learning is for life - No matter where you may be in the corporate structure; make sure you regularly take out the time to keep learning. Where you attend a classroom based/web based course, product demonstration by a vendor or simply reviewing papers and publications (each of these learning methods has their own benefit; don't ignore the benefit of self teaching!) to keep yourself abreast - ensure that you allot a window through each month where you take time off the mill to reflect, critique, learn and develop.
• Sharing is caring - Share your knowledge readily with colleagues on your area of expertise. Engage healthy discussion, write blog posts, review publications, carry out some academic research. It all helps one gain new perspectives and only deepens your own understanding, as well as that of your team. This candid approach will also bring peers and stakeholders onto a common platform of understanding.

Your feedback as always is most welcome - musabqureshi4[AT]yahoo.co.uk

Best regards,

Musab Q.

Averting common Problem Management problems...

Hello,

Let me share with you in this post a couple of 'issues' for want of a better word we face all the often when it comes to the invaluable and unfortunately neglected process of Problem Management...

It is vital that due consideration is given to the assignment of Roles. Keep in mind that roles are ultimately mapped over to the responsibilities that are then accorded to assigned resources for implementation. So what we come across in so many organisations today is assignment of the Incident Manager and Problem Manager being given to one and the same person.

This is akin somewhat to asking the bowler during a cricket match to also wear the hat of the wicket keeper! It might be possible for the bowler to also be a part-time fielder (by trying to catch shots that come in his direction). However, would you not agree that it would not be prudent for the bowler to also be the wicket keeper since their objectives are variant in nature?  Similarly, the roles of Incident Manager and Problem Manager should certainly not be assigned to a single person.

The misunderstanding in this regard can stem from not fully comprehending the focus of each of these processes. Incident Management is a fire fighting process whose target is in essence 'speed' and therefore the people tasked with this process focus on restoring normal service operation as quickly as possible. Acceptable sacrifices may need to be made in other areas to achieve this. Problem management however is not measured against the clock. Rather, the performance of this process in your organisation is assessed based upon preventing recurrence of Incidents. Therefore the depth of technical know-how and analytical focus of this process places it fathoms apart from Incident management. When they are combined under a single manager, inevitably over the passing of time Incident management naturally garners more and more attention consequently receding Problem management to the wayside.

Another overlooked area affecting Problem management is in respect of the Problem Manager's authority and influence with key stakeholders. If he/she does not have the visible management support, their involvement and management of major problem reviews and being involved in root cause analysis can be restricted by other support group staff (who may wrongly view the Problem Manager's involvement as an intrusion of their territory). Therefore, upon assignment of the Problem Manager, there needs to be an ongoing awareness and communication of the role of the Problem Manager and how it complements the work of Second Level Support teams, specialists from Third Party Support providers and other staff involved with problem investigation and analysis.

Another key aspect which impacts effectiveness of Problem Management is a lack of appreciation of the business value of the Problem Management. Subsequently, the requisite resources for Problem Management are not devoted to the process and implementation suffers gaps in execution. Consider the following examples of the impact of technology failure:

• Amazon suffered an outage in 2008 for a duration of 2 hours; the company lost $3.8 million and suffered a drop in stock value of 4.6% on the same day
• A Coleman Parkes Research report analysed feedback from 200 North American organisations and found the average financial impact of downtime per annum per organisation was:
• $224,000 + in lost revenue affecting Financial sector organisations
• $196,000+ in lost revenue affecting Manufacturing organisations
• $117,000+ in lost revenue affecting their Retail equivalents.

[Reference: http://www.arcserve.com/us/lpg/costofdowntime.aspx]

Therefore, it is evident that the fire-fighting process of Incident Management is not sufficient in reducing risks and maintaining a level of Availability that can serve business requirements. This is where Problem management provides a real helping hand by the following:

• Greater staff motivation as they have ready access to Workarounds and Known errors which assists in more accurate diagnosis and speedy resolution.
• Problem management gears resources on retaining support knowledge in a form and fashion that can be shared by all ITIL processes. Known Error records are made available to search for solutions at any time of the analysis and investigation stages. The result is inevitably a reduced frequency of failure and a reduced impact of failure where it does take place.
• A reduction in support cost due to a reduction in repeat Incidents.

It can be seen that placing greater emphasis on Problem management, its adoption and more focussed implementation results in the aforementioned benefits being attained along with an enhanced level of preventing or reducing the impact of failures as and when they occur.

Your comments as always are welcome on musabqureshi4[AT]yahoo.co.uk.

Best regards,

Musab Q.

My Favourite Android Apps...

Hello,

With the the relentless success of Google in the mobile space, one would be remiss to not devote a post to interesting and beneficial apps from the Android genre. Here is a list of some of the apps I would heartily recommend:

Skype: The mobile version works surprisingly well and is a wee bit simpler to use than the Windows 8 version (that links Skype accounts with Windows profiles).

WhatsApp: The concept of WhatsApp is revolutionary and yet effective - hence its success across a number of platforms. The ability to send your location using the GPS function can be so useful.

Google Navigation: A simple and yet fairly effective GPS guiding system for your car. The satellite imaginary of places you pass can help change a mundane drive around the M25 orbital into a somewhat more interesting experience.

Evernote: A fairly intuitive notes app that automatically synchronises with it's partner on the Desktop. The Skitch add-on supports handwriting which provides a more reliable service than the S Memo offering that is provided by default.

Adobe Reader: Despite a number of PDF readers available, the sleek design, annotation options and bookmarking place this app on my list of favourites.

HBR Summaries: Stay abreast of new research highlights from the Harvard Business School with the convenience of your handset.

Root Explorer: A File Manager for your Android tree structure that gives access to those hard to reach places. Integration with 3rd party systems such as Dropbox is extremely useful.

Kapersky Mobile Security: In addition to regular antivirus and other threat protection, it comes with a function for locating a lost or stolen handset.

Chrome browser: The synchronisation with your Google account combined with a fast and easy-to-use browsing experience is a God-send for both work and play.

Amazon store: The smart design helps optimise the shopping experience for the mobile user - can be a real time-saver!

Kind regards,

Musab

What is Business Process Management?

Hello,

Business Process Management or BPM as it is often abbreviated is a challenge to describe succinctly. This is because since the early nineties when the concept emerged as somewhat a fad, an entire industry has emerged around this. This includes a number of extremely powerful tool set solutions, both academic and commercial R&D and professional services.  All of these assist organisations in establishing a framework for modelling and improving business processes.Therefore formulating a definition that addresses all of these aspects is no simple endeavour.

However, the following should at least provide some food for thought and perhaps a basis upon which a more comprehensive definition may be studied and developed:

"Business Process Management may be viewed as a formal method for modelling and managing the activities of a particular organisation."

Process flows are analysed and captured visually. Once completed, these are shared with stakeholders in order to help them comprehend the 'way things work'. Thus they provide invaluable support in enhancing communication with the respective stakeholders involved.

When it comes to modelling, there could be layers of abstraction that help manage the complexity demanded, e.g. a business process layer, a technology layer and a management dashboard that maintains the requisite KPIs for reporting.

Processes may be categorised in a number of ways; one possible approach is the following:

(1) Processes associated with inputs or acquisition, these include for instance Sales or Marketing - these address how your customer or user initiates the flows, how payments are collected for instance.

(2) Processes that convert these inputs or raw materials into the final products or services according to the required specifications, for instance an expense claim process or a particular order or request fulfilment process.

Processes are never caste in stone - rather re-engineering of processes is an extremely valuable exercise. It considers aspects such as areas in the flow of duplication of effort, unnecessary tasks that may be eliminated, areas in the flow where delays take place and identifying opportunities for automation.

As a result, BPM can result in cost-reductions for the organisation through improvements in efficiency and effectiveness, increased productivity of staff, enhanced quality and a faster time-to-market.

Last but not least, keep-in-mind that new processes means a new way of working (models such as the unfreeze-change-freeze approach are needed). Mentoring and guiding staff on process updates is a necessary albeit challenging area of BPM in action.

Best regards,

Musab Qureshi

musabqureshi4@yahoo.co.uk

ITIL and ISO 20000 - Birds of a feather flock together...

Hi,

In April 2011, publication of Part I of the ISO/IEC 20000 standard was released.

Around three months following from this, the UK Cabinet Office published the update to the IT Infrastructure Library (ITIL).

This post helps address a number of questions related to ISO 20000 and the 2011 update of the ITIL framework. It discusses three areas where ITIL and ISO 20000 are complementary. Questions addressed include the following:

What is the focus of each of these systems? How can value be gained from them? Are they able to operate in synergy?

If you consider that ITIL is a library of of best-practice guidance. It demonstrates guidance through which the IT organisation may plan for, design, transition, manage and improve IT services.

However, Management often want to implement a median-level of ITIL guidance (you could say 'Level 3' from a scale of Level 0 to Level 5). They desire guidance on what parts of ITIL need to be implemented to achieve such a level.

Therefore, this post suggest three areas where the ITIL Framework and the ISO 20000 standard complement one another. In other words, where the two systems may be used in parallel to achieve the greatest level of value.


1. ISO 20000 helps with ITIL scoping

Scoping of ITIL projects is a challenge to say the least. One of the key aspects to consider is that of maturity. We already discussed how many, if not most organisations can suffice with an 'average' level of ITIL process maturity.

The ISO 20000 standard provides control requirements across majority of the principle ITIL processes up to the equivalent of a Level 3 – which more than the often, suits both IT service providers and customer requirements fairly well.

An assessment of your organisation against the ISO standard and defining the requisite initiatives to close gaps provides well for clarifying an agreed scope for ITIL project scoping.


2. ISO 20000 helps maintain ITIL implementation

Process enhancement all the often executes as a project with guidance provided by ITIL Experts/Consultants.

But how does the organisation continue to maintain the relevance of the policies, procedures and processes once the project is over? Much hard work is invested within both their development and implementation, therefore there need to be smart methods of retaining process alignment longer-term.

ISO 2000 is invaluable in this regard from a number of aspects, such as the following:

• The ISO standard has Management and Governance built-in as an explicit set of controls. This provides amongst other things, a mechanism and schedule for auditing the compliance of the ITIL processes. What this does is provide assurance that IT maintains its compliance on a continuous basis.
• All updates are mandated to be approved through the Change Management process - this helps maintain the relevance of documentation.
• The controls of ISO 20000 provide management with demonstrable evidence of process compliance. The standard mandates requirements using the verb 'shall' thus stipulating mandatory activities to ensure ITIL process compliance.
• In order for the organisation to retain certification status, minor audits are mandated annually and full audits every three years. This also serves to ensure continued compliance.

3. ISO 20000 and ITIL have Unique Differences

The former is a standard - a collection of explicit controls whose implementation can be audited against, i.e. a 'what to' approach.

The latter contains tried and tested, best practice guidance for managing quality, business-aligned IT services, i.e. a 'how to' approach.

One example that demonstrates how the differences between  ISO 20000 and ITIL actually address gaps is that of the Service Reporting process.

The 2011 update of ITIL recedes Service Reporting and Service Measurement to becoming a technique or method. This runs the danger of this extremely important area being neglected over time. However, ISO 20000 bring the due focus on reporting back by devoting a section of the standard to this process.

Best regards,

Musab Qureshi

musabqureshi4@yahoo.co.uk

Three Tips on what makes a good IT Strategy?

Hello,

In this post I will be sharing some experience-based pointers on what a 'good' (for want of a better word) IT Strategy is characterised by. Disciplined implementation is crucial, however the due focus is also necessary in respect of the planning process and its maturity. As Drucker once said 'there is nothing so useless as doing efficiently that which should not be done at all'. Following are three key aspects to look for when assessing the health of your IT strategy:

1. Ease of understanding
Reduce the usage of technical jargon, such that the C-Level suite can quickly absorb the meaningful content. This in order to grasp the linkage between the business plans, drivers and constraints and how IT will support them. The scenarios (addressing the key stakeholder viewpoints or concerns) that IT can traverse should be presented along with the pro's and con's of each of them. Justification of the selected approach and plan should demonstrate the benefits and value as it pertains to the business environment at the given time.

If you consider that the 'CIO' title is more-or-less out of date within today's more intricate corporate environment (today's CIO manages far more than mere 'information' assets). Similarly today's strategy extends beyond a list of IT applications and cost 'reduction' forecasts. It needs to be a business document that clearly demonstrates the impact of IT capabilities and delivery on business goals, targets, financial health and so on.

2. Collaboration necessary, but too much of a good thing becomes...
No strategy can be developed without key stakeholder inputs, review, collaboration, acceptance and so on. However the adage of 'too many cooks spoiling the broth' needs be borne in mind. If the planning process is overly bureaucratic  the strategy will unfortunately not reap the desired benefits. Bear in mind that Strategic planning is a process and a means to a more noble end.

3. Ease of Measure
If the strategy implementation cannot be measured, it cannot be managed! Therefore once the planning exercises have been completed, the translation of these into actionable and measurable initiatives is the next crucial stage. Progressive and SMART targets help demonstrate the value of implementing agreed initiatives and this is especially important when striving to maintain a continuum.

Your comments as always are appreciated - musabqureshi4@yahoo.co.uk

Musab Qureshi

2013 Calendar...

Hello,

My blog calendar for 2013 is available for download at the following location:

Click here...

Regards,

Musab

Honoured to be on expert review board of new publication...

Hi,

The TSO have published a new title as part of their ITIL publications; Designing and Transforming IT Organizations: Roles, Responsibilities and Organization Structures.

Authored by Job Ten Hagen, I was honoured to be part of the review team assigned a section of this prodigious project. The author has kindly made a preview of the book available at the following:

• http://bit.ly/sampleORG - I'm mentioned on the acknowledgements page as part of the review team.

We may be familiar with the conundrum of people, processes, products and partners. However, as ITSM continues to mature, more detailed and prescriptive guidance is needed to address the 'people' domain. This book provides beneficial recommendations and tools related to the human factor in organisational success; ones that are based upon academically sound principles and that have proven to work in the real world. 

Some of the areas covered are guidance on roles, job descriptions, responsibilities and authorities, skills, accountability and governance.

The book may be purchased directly from the TSO at the following:

• http://bit.ly/organize-IT

Or from Amazon at the following:

• http://amzn.to/S9QzcC

Your comments as always are welcome; musabqureshi4@yahoo.co.uk.

Best regards,

Musab

How to (and how not to!) perform effective SLA reporting...

Hello,

The experience based guidance provided in this posting although intended for Service Level Agreement (SLA) reporting, is in the large applicable to many of the reports management are tasked with. 

The IT Organisation of today is positioned all the more as a layer between the Customers and Users (beneficiaries) of the service on one side & the internal organisations and external providers on the other. 

The SLA therefore represents the capabilities of the service provider to meet agreed service levels.

The agreement written in a language intelligible to the customers and users, the SLA contains as a minimum the following:

• A description of the services being provided;
• Agreed targets for delivery and support, and
• Responsibilities of both the service provider and customer.

Following are some tips to help obtain value from your SLA reporting:

• Take time to understand who will be reading the report and what they need to know. One method is to sub-divide the report across multiple layers of abstraction. If the reader wants more detail, they should have the option to drill down thru further levels. Consider views of the report customised for each customer group.

• Keep in mind human nature; when information is processed by the recipient, they're constantly asking 'so what?' - address his/her concerns. Your SLA report need to elucidate  what happened, what was done to rectify where service levels were breached & what actions are being taken to prevent recurrence.

• Beware of misinterpretation; a picture is worth a thousand words, but are you portraying the right words? The staff collecting the data and the staff preparing the final report need not be the same. The former ensure timely and completeness. The latter ensure the end-to-end service reporting is relevant and complete & conveys the intended message without leaving any room for ambiguity.

• A historical perspective of performance is important as it shows trends and helps demonstrate the value of the processes and the impact of their implementation on service quality over time. More importantly, use the report to showcase how IT dealt with historical issues and managed to resolve them effectively.

• Reports need to be future looking as well as historical; this is achieved through development of sensible targets and the measurement of actual delivery against these planned and agreed targets. Consider using 'agreed' targets and 'stretch' targets; the latter help emphasize where IT went the extra mile and delivered a fair bit beyond what was agreed.

• Provide a reference section that provides definitions of all terms used, the basis of calculations, the reporting schedules, report distribution and meeting schedules (to present the report).

• Use tools to help automate and streamline the process, but keep in mind the intent of Bill Gates when he said that 'automation applied to an inefficient operation will magnify the inefficiency'. My advice when it comes to tools is always to start with people, ensuring they understand why it's important, their role and clarify how the measures are to be understood or interpreted. Once these foundation aspects have been achieved, the transition to powerful reporting technologies is far more effective.

• Depending upon the frequency of reporting, meet with your customers/users to present the report. Tweak the report to meet their needs, while at the same ensuring no important areas are neglected.

SLA reporting and infact ITIL and ITSM overall is a journey, it isn't a project. It's about building a culture where we each person is a cog in the machinery. They need to comprehend their area and perform it to a level such that the overall machine can function and deliver what has been agreed and promised in the SLA.

Comments most welcome on musabqureshi4@yahoo.co.uk.

Best regards,

Musab

The inextricable link between budgets and strategy...

Hello,


In the 1920's James McKinsey defined some core budgeting principles and practices in his book 'Budgetry Control'- the design of today's general ledger is based around that. Financial corporate and business unit performance is also structured around this pervasive system.

This poses some interesting challenges for today's management. A Corporate Planning function typically plans and develops the over-arching strategy, the vision and mission for which the organisation exists and the objectives against which resources are to be prioritised, aligned and re-aligned.

Financial resources are established as a key component that impact the success of strategy implementation in today's fast-paced, and somewhat unpredictable business environments.

However, a challenge bears to weight when strategic planning traverses upon one path; that to understand and delineate the why, what and how of the organisation's focus over a defined period. And the budgeting organisations traverse a path of managing the financial element. Each of these paths often make some inroad into the territory of the other. However, gaps continue to remain.

There are some important points of consideration that can provide useful guidance in this area:

• Organisational change is a natural process that takes time, requires leadership and a concerted effort. The unfreeze-change-freeze cycle if rushed leads to blunders that may not be realised until some time has passed.
• Astute organisations look for ways to help close the gap. One proven approach is the Balanced Scorecard. The Financial perspective can define objectives, measures and targets that are integrated with the Budgeting policies and processes. This way adjustments needed impact both the strategic planning and budget control simultaneously. This leads to more diligent management of financial and non-financial resources alike.
• This mechanism provides another benefit; the ability to visualise the link between budget spend and key initiatives; thus demonstrating the business value of dollar-spend.
• The mapping of budget spend against the strategic objectives brings another perspective; it permits the discerning of budget spent on keeping the engines running cf budget spent on strategic initiatives.

As mentioned, the balanced scorecard is one method of achieving this, along with other similar methods and approaches.

Regards,

Musab

What is E-Government?

Hi, 

A Google or Bing on the subject will yield a wide plethora of definitions; many of them surprisingly different; each genre facilitating a unique emphasis or perspective.

Some definitions tend towards focusing more on the technology used, others look towards societal aspects and yet others give more weight to the supporting business processes.

Coming up with a balanced definition that considers not only the diversity of perspectives but one that also is up to date with current research and development is challenging to say the least.

Nonetheless, here's my tuppence worth on formulating a definition on e-government that strives to meet these criteria to some degree.

"E-Government is the use of technology (Internet, portals, mobile computing and so on) to provide innovative platforms for Citizens (G2C), Businesses (G2B), Visitors (G2V), peer Government agencies (G2G) and so on to interact and communicate better."

Some of the benefits therefore that may be accrued from e-Government may be outlined as follows:

• Increased transparency as users (citizens, businesses etc.) can directly log into electronic systems to track and manage their requests without relying upon human actors thru every step of the process flow.
• Greater empowerment of citizens thanks to access to the information, new channels of communication and a multitude of automated e-services.
• Improved security as requests and information are held on secure and managed networks.
• A consequent decrease in corruption overall.

Despite these advantages, there are numerous barriers that continue to pose a challenge to the more widespread use of e-Government. These include the following:

• The digital divide where people simply do not have the access to the requisite technologies that access to e-Government services needs.
• The knowledge divide; many services mandate a particular level of literacy and PC know-how to avail e-government services. There is a dearth of IT skills in some geographies and also in segments of society who may be greatly in need of the particular e-service.
• Disproportionate Internet connectivity across countries and areas within a country (city vs. rural for instance).

Research continues to highlight dilient approaches for addressing these areas and astute governments are already making headway. No doubt this trend will continue to enhance maturity levels until the gap is reduced even further. 

Your feedback us welcome; musabqureshi4@yahoo.co.uk.

Best regards,

Musab Qureshi

;