Modernising IT to meet the demands of Generation Y

If an organisation’s most prized asset is its workforce, then responding to their needs in technology and software tools should be a priority. However, a walk around many large corporates will find evidence of office automation tooling from 10+ years ago still in place (e.g. spreadsheets for work management methods and email for corporate comms). Forrester found that both knowledge workers and managers alike recognise the potential value in adding peer-to-peer social collaboration; work management tools that allow employees to work to common goals and adjust their own deadlines according to business goals are key.

As Generation Y enters the workforce, they come pre-equipped with a laptop (97%), a mobile phone (94%), instant messaging capability (74%) and will readily multi-task whilst using them (92%).

They will be craving workspaces and communities to collaborate and demand access to the latest and fastest technologies. Their preference is for a working environment where they can share, comment and collaborate using social and mobile business tools – in short, a social enterprise.

These needs are arguably at their most evident where the demand side of the organisation meets the supply side, or where users go to request new stuff and want existing stuff fixed – this is the workplace of IT service management (ITSM). Traditionally, using legacy solutions, ITSM was about formal communication and manual processes maintained and dispensed by a select band. Where a software tool was deployed it’s often cumbersome, heavyweight and with limited ability to interact directly with service desk agents. A Generation Y response requires a new, simple, intuitive, social, scalable way for IT to get back in front.

A visit to the service desk can be an interactive chat session which contributes to a knowledge article

One example of such a solution is the software-as-a-service (SaaS) model from Service-Now. This is a cloud-driven technology that not only helps reduce and flatten costs (through a standard user per month fee for all modules) but offers business value by simplifying operations and reporting of activities. With social and mobile technologies embedded within the tool, adoption across the workplace is accelerated along with greater collaboration, self-service and fulfilment.

Raising a request with the service desk can result in a real-time chat session where experts are involved when needed rather than notified separately by a support ticket or email. The journaled interactive session can then be scrubbed, converted into a knowledge article and added to an online Wiki for other users to browse. Corporate communications can be shared via a wall, specific IT updates promoted across interested communities, individual requests and incidents monitored by the end user and performance metrics added to personal dashboards. The user experience is consistent with any social media site and is available across smartphone, tablet, desktop and laptop.

One up-to-date and consistent data set enables better decision making

Furthermore, ITSM functions (such as incident, problem, change, config, service catalogue and request management) all use the same data set, so management reporting can be a simple but powerful dashboard to help improve decision making for capacity planning and demand forecasting. This is also important for businesses that have little to no idea what results their workers (often their biggest investment) are returning, or how to fully exploit knowledge workers’ potential, in relation to innovation in new products, markets and business models.

Nearly one in four (37%) of the managers surveyed in Forrester’s research and 63 percent of knowledge workers disagreed with the statement “our organisation tracks ROI on knowledge worker investments” – this is worrying. If companies can’t see what works well and what doesn’t, then Mark Twain’s adage will deter the Generation Y knowledge workers; “If you do what you’ve always done, you’ll get what you always got.”

3 key phases to transforming IT service management

4sl are helping organisations keep pace with the consumerisation of IT. We look at the IT landscape from both the demand and supply sides and with our proven Landscape Profiling™ method, identify 3 key phases to transform IT service management.

As ITSM director, Stuart Tarrant has worked directly with various stakeholders across enterprise IT to devise action plans that deliver immediate results whilst simplifying IT. Contact us to arrange a meeting with Stuart and find out how he can develop a plan that will help yopu transform your IT landscape.