Operations | Monitoring | ITSM | DevOps | Cloud

As ITSM thought leader and consultant Doug Tedder has said, “Automate the obvious.” So what’s obvious? We shouldn’t have to think very long…

When you read the phrase “employee experience” (or even just good-old “user experience”), what comes to mind? One of the first things most of us think about, at least in an IT setting, is probably a system’s user interface. How hard or easy is the software to use? How intuitive is it? How appealing is its design? These are important considerations, but a good experience requires more than a good interface.

The concept of project management isn’t new, but project management is in the spotlight today. Why? Organizations everywhere face enormous pressure to consistently identify, develop, and launch the right solutions, products, or services to address market realities and enable digital transformation. A key factor to success is using the right delivery methodology and, increasingly, the answer is Agile.

Vikram Walecha, chief technology officer for ServiceNow at IBM, co-authored this blog. 5G has opened the door to a wealth of new opportunities for communications service providers (CSPs), from higher speeds to new network technologies. Forward-thinking CSPs will be able to target new customers, new buyers, and new markets with innovative products and offerings that will leverage 5G capabilities to accelerate digital transformation across multiple industries.

Service level agreements (SLAs), if used correctly, can be one of the most important tools in a service-oriented organization. Done well, they communicate what’s expected of all parties and can go a long way to improving the relationship between the business and its IT organization. Some would even argue that good IT service management (ITSM) is built on a bedrock of SLAs (as well as continual improvement). Here are four tips for building more effective SLAs.

To change or not to change? It is a question that every IT leader faces in the wake of lagging technology growth. While IT leaders aren’t blind to the problem, change remains elusive. Instead of risking stability and performance by switching to an unknown alternative, many leaders stick with their known incumbent. But that’s not the case anymore. We see a new generation of IT leaders challenging the status quo and transforming the technology behind world-leading companies.

Ransomware experienced a stunning surge in prevalence and sophistication throughout the pandemic. Threat actors capitalized on a frequently shaky transition to a remote, digital business landscape. With so many businesses prioritizing basic functionality over proactive security, vulnerabilities have been unprecedented – and very much exploited.

We all know one bad experience can impact a customer’s perception of—and even willingness to deal with—an organization going forward. That’s why so many companies, in virtually every industry, have made investing in customer experience (CX) a top priority, according to ResearchAndMarkets.com. The problem is, for any given organization, there are a number of customer service processes along the entire life span of an interaction that need to be looked at and made great.