Congratulations! You’ve purchased this great new service management technology called ServiceNow – now what? It’s like a big box of Legos where anything can be built, so what’s the right approach to take to ensure success? Is there a tried and true model? You’ve seen many other software applications turn into shelfware or get replaced in three years – how do you avoid that? Given the expanse of service management in the enterprise and its numerous applications, these considerations are very real.
While NPI is most heavily involved in helping clients optimize the actual IT sourcing event (e.g. purchase, renewal, etc.), we have a unique perspective on what happens during the “in-between.” This could be the time leading up to a renewal or when a client is struggling to capture the value from a purchase mid-contract.
It’s our mission to deliver a fair deal to our clients but we are also vested in the satisfaction our clients experience post-transaction – especially when it comes to ROI. We’ve found that customers that achieve a solid ROI also achieve more favorable pricing when they renew or expand their ServiceNow investment.
Here are some tips to make sure your ServiceNow investment delivers value and savings for the long-term.
Have a plan. You bought ServiceNow for a reason. Formulate an implementation plan based on your top use cases. The goal is to get the tool implemented and adopted. Stick to the next 6 months’ timeframe to get the foundation set, then expand from there.
Time to value. ServiceNow and its partners encourage Agile-style implementation to achieve quick user adoption. This is a proven methodology and much more effective than an elongated, boil-the-ocean approach. A side bonus is that if your organization is not experienced with Agile implementations, this is a great way to gain exposure and training.
Decide where ServiceNow ownership will reside. Where ServiceNow oversight resides and who is on the team will greatly affect adoption within your organization. The team should have direct exposure to lines of business because it’s an enterprise service management platform, not just an IT operations tool. The team should be comprised of people that have scripting capability and can work not only with IT but also with business areas to identify how existing processes can be easily automated.
Engage an experienced ServiceNow partner. ServiceNow Professional Services or one of their many qualified partners is a must for the initial phases of implementing ServiceNow into your organization. The Agile model, knowledge transfer, training, and documentation will be invaluable to your team as you ramp up.
Start with the basics – the common approach. Companies buy ServiceNow for different reasons, and even though it’s an enterprise service management suite, the typical initial use case still centers around replacing an outdated, cumbersome legacy IT service management (ITSM) application. By taking this approach, your organization will focus on first getting the IT organization right, enabling you to then replicate the process to other business areas such as HR, finance or customer service. Our advice is to become familiar with the typical ServiceNow implementation roadmap that will set the core functionality in place during the first 4 to 6 months.
One last thing… Once you’ve implemented the basics, you’re only just getting started. Schedule a roadmap planning session with key members of IT and business senior leadership – and revisit the roadmap every 6 months. This will enable you to expose the organization to how ServiceNow can automate key pain areas within the organization and prioritize your ServiceNow projects. By taking these steps, you will maximize your success with the solution, increase adoption and time to value, and be in the driver’s seat for future ServiceNow investments and renewals.
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