Many IT Organizations today struggle with finding the right approach to managing IT in ever increasingly complex environments. Fortunately (or in some cases unfortunately) there is no lack of best practices and frameworks out there that you could employ to help you on your journey. This workshop will focus on understanding the various best practices that exist in our industry today and how they can be employed effectively to help you optimize your IT processes, organizational effectiveness, compliance programs, information security, and quality programs.

Key Takeaways

This session will discuss and outline what ‘Lean Six Sigma’ is, and how it can be used as a complimentary framework to manage your ITSM capability, processes and projects. The session will leave you with the understanding of how a global manufacturing company has approached this common issue and also with some basic tools and principles to apply to your process improvement projects and activities.

Key Takeaways
There are many frameworks and standards that can be leveraged when implementing and practicing services management. One of them, ISO/IEC 20000 (ISO 20000), is the international standard that validates an organization’s conformance to service management best practices.

In this interactive session, learn how the ISO 20000 standard can provide guidance on what a service provider organization needs to do to achieve effective, efficient, and economical service management processes. Additionally, you will understand what types of organizations can apply for the ISO/IEC 20000 certification and the differences between ITIL and ISO/IEC 20000.

Key Takeaways
  • Understanding the ISO/IEC 20000 standard
  • Understanding the relationship between ITIL and ISO/IEC 20000
  • Identify types of service management tools necessary for service providers to have to manage their business
    • During this workshop, you will be exposed to what is informally referred to as the ISO 27000 suite of standards. Particular focus will be on the ISO 27001 and 27002 standards. The 27002 standards will be related to their corresponding ITIL counterparts where appropriate, and participants will receive a chart showing those relationships.

    You will create a mind map that shows the security components associated with the standard and will design and develop an information security/assurance org chart for your current employer. You will leave the workshop with quick references and process flow charts for the various ISO 27002 topic areas.

    Key Takeaways
  • Knowledge and understanding of ISO 27001 and ISO 27002
  • Standards and practical knowledge on how to setup an information security/assurance group
  • Practical knowledge on which IT support and IT delivery best practices have the greatest impact on the organization’s information security/assurance posture

    • A common challenge for IT Service organization is how to integrate services management with the activities of the project management office (PMO) and applications development, which seem to have conflicting priorities and methodologies.

    This session will explain the synergies (and differences) between these methodologies, allowing you to move these groups to ITSM supporters, as they will understand how the service lifecycle integrates with project management, resulting in a better outcome.

    Key Takeaways
    You cost too much! Do more with less! My allocation is too big! Outsourcing will save money! All these complaints and challenges are symptoms rooted in your resource governance processes.

    When you think like a business within a business, the problem is clear: customers want more than the enterprise can afford to buy from you. While charge-backs aren’t necessary, you do need a service catalog with accurate costs.

    Key Takeaways
    ITIL Lite is an approach to implementing key components of ITIL v3 to ensure a sound basis for IT Service Management—either as a starting point for full implementation or as a deliverable for those not wishing to fully implement ITIL v3.

    This workshop presents a step-by-step approach which helps you select the most appropriate ITIL v3 components for your organization and then prepare a project to implement those components. It is ideal for those wanting an overview of ITIL or ITIL newcomers wanting to get a great start to their project.

    Key Takeaways
  • How to choose which ITIL components you need to install in your organization: fit for purpose
  • Templates to help you structure your ITIL components
  • How to remove the complexity from ITIL v3 and reduce ITIL to bite sized pieces
    • Working with either Incident, Problem or Change Management, this session will help you identify your current level of process maturity, establish an appropriate maturity goal, and define a plan of action using the predefined concepts in the COBIT Framework.

    Leave this session with a detailed list of the top ten things you can do to improve your process and the value it provides to the business.

    Key Takeaways
  • Identify the business goals, IT goals, and IT process linkage and how your process relates to creating business value
  • Applying the CMM maturity model for your process to understand the current level of maturity
  • Evaluate the process using the detailed attributes table
    • In today’s IT organization, we must manage the risk associated with providing IT services to the business and to our customers. Risk has become the number one issue facing companies, and it has gone unmanaged. This session will explore the concepts of IT governance and focuses on the primary domain of risk management.

    Key Takeaways
  • What is IT governance?
  • The role of risk management in IT governance
  • Concepts of risk management
    • We typically hire considering someone’s IQ and/or technical skills and education. Yet, we fire staff based upon their lack of emotional intelligence (their attitude or inability to get along with others). In this session we will dissect emotional intelligence into its competencies, interactively raise your self-awareness, and emotional literacy.

    Every person needs to be aware of not only what they are projecting to others, but also how to constructively approach the subject of emotional and social intelligence. This yields clearer communication, which improves performance and team engagement.

    Key Takeaways
    Many negotiation courses simply give us tips and techniques. In this session, we will understand the underlying human motivators that make negotiating easy to understand and approach. Give yourself a deeper understanding of what drives the person across the table and how to respond to their objections.

    Key Takeaways
    Learn how you can create a high performance culture that will produce the desired performance outcomes in productivity, profitability, employee retention, and customer satisfaction. The key is intentionally identifying and developing the essential factors that impact performance: leadership principles, management practices, team alignment, and employee behavior.

    Key Takeaways
  • Learn about the dangerous assumptions many make about culture
  • Understand the difference between Culturetopia and traditional management styles
  • Know why values are central to Culturetopia
  • Learn the seven values of Culturetopia and how to implement them
    • Many IT organizations are embarking on ITSM initiatives or are already improving service delivery and support. Some strive to achieve the most coveted three Es (efficiency, effectiveness, and economy) for everything they do—all while working towards a true business partnership.

    You have likely heard that process and technology are easy and that people are often the biggest challenge. When faced with the classic triad “people, process, and technology,” the real pain and roadblocks organizations often face relate to the people side. This session will help you develop an understanding of core people-related challenges and pain points associated with a service management improvements journey.

    Key Takeaways
  • Reference table with actions and tasks required for the 10 most common pain points/roadblocks
  • Document outlining the core “WIIFM” (what’s in it for me) for core stakeholders to assist with the change aspects
  • A high level road map for the organization’s change aspects of ITSM (focusing on risk mitigation, communication, marketing, awareness, the buy in, adoption, and sustainability)
    • This workshop is designed to provide a holistic view of social networks, both internal and external, and teach you the fundamentals of how and why they work. We will present case studies that illustrate how other organizations were able to use this phenomenon to their advantage. Then, we will address the various incentive and motivation structures that encourage your customers and employees to collaborate and provide you the vital information you need to succeed.

    Key Takeaways
  • Strong understanding of social networks and the potential benefits to your organization and more specifically your ITSM program and support organization
  • Checklist of key factors that must be employed in any social network implementation for it to work and provide desired benefits
  • Practical tips on how to harvest the wisdom of crowds of external communities, i.e. your customers, and turn this feedback to much needed products and services
    • Knowledge management is an absolute requirement for improving efficiencies and enabling an organization to expand its services or deliver different types of services. Yet often it is considered optional and therefore either not done at all or not done well. Knowledge management is more than just the creation of a knowledge base and the use of a tool; it’s a critical process for capturing the assets of an organization.

    You will leave this session with a foundational understanding of best practice methodologies in knowledge management.

    Key Takeaways
    Too often in a majority of process transformation initiatives, process artifacts are created and then quickly become outdated and irrelevant. Great value can be achieved through creating and maintaining useful process content in an active and manageable format.

    This workshop will focus on defining appropriate process content, identifying key process deliverables, and explore methods and tools for actively managing the content once it is created.

    Key Takeaways


    Event management offers tremendous benefits for improving both operational and security incident handling. Moreover, it can improve the use of monitoring tools and knowledge transfer while helping to reduce “mean time to restore service”. This workshop will provide background on the need for event management and will focus on the design and implementation of the process.

    Key Takeaways
  • An overview of the process including objectives and benefits
  • Why event management needs to begin with service design
  • Key integration points between event and other processes
    • After service has been restored for a major outage, the real work often begins: trying to determine the cause, assess options for resolution, and making corrections. Many organizations performing problem management activities are inefficient and spend too much resource for the results they get.

    Often this is a result of lack of problem management training or standard methodology. This session will introduce and explain the different problem management methodologies, the pros and cons of each, and when to use of them.

    Key Takeaways
  • Understand the ITIL problem management process
  • Be able to identify the problem solving techniques to use in different situations
  • Be able to perform Pareto Analysis, Ishikawa Diagram, Kepner-Tregoe Analysis, FEMA Analysis, Causal Recursion and more. Templates for each will be presented.
  • Understanding of which methodology to use based on the organization and type of problems
    • Why can’t organizations achieve the levels of maturity that software vendors promise with the use of integrated service management support tools? What can be learned by saying “how can we make it work” and not “how can we fit it within the defined best practices as our software defines them”?

    We all have been told that the value of service management processes (ITIL/MOF/ISO2000/CObIT) is found in the integration of core processes (i.e. change, release and deployment, service asset, and configuration). The challenge is knowing when to conform with the theory and when to diverge to optimize the benefits/costs/timing requirements. This workshop will provide an overview of practical concepts in the service transition area.

    Key Takeaways
  • Understand how to recognize what is “good enough” for a first pass
  • Understand how the interdependency between change and configuration management can become an advantage
  • Learn about the concept of managed and unmanaged CIs
    • Defining and valuing IT services are key steps in ITIL strategy generation as well as ITIL Service Portfolio Management. Knowing what you do for whom, and why, makes your success more likely.

    Start by defining IT services in order to identify the business and technical services that support your customers. Then, learn how to value your IT services in business terms to know which service is more important and why—so you can prioritize and balance resource allocations and justify projects and activities.

    Key Takeaways
  • Understand where IT service value originates (it may not be where you think)
  • Understand how to value IT services in business terms
  • Determine how to prioritize your IT activities based on service value
  • Take home reusable templates so you can define services anywhere, anytime


    • Business alignment has become a fundamental goal for IT enterprises, and it is a critical aspect of optimizing service management. Demonstrating value, maximizing the IT investment, and true partnership are elements of service management that a lot of IT enterprise realize they need to accomplish, yet often struggle to achieve.

    Key Takeaways
    During this workshop the participant will be exposed to a blend of risk management theories that covers NIST, ISO 27002, and Peltier’s methodologies. This workshop covers practical application and “how to” from the viewpoint of an experienced practitioner who has been there and done that. You will walk through the entire risk management process–from initial assessment to mitigation strategy discussion/decision through management roll-up of the findings. Participants will walk away from the workshop with a set of templates that will allow them to return to their organization and perform their own internal risk assessment.

    Key Takeaways
  • Knowledge and understanding of the risk identification process
  • Knowledge and understanding of the risk assessment process
  • Take-home template for risk assessment
    • This workshop combines a case study with hands-on activities. It begins with a segment on designing ITSM processes that engage the business, followed by a discussion on how the attitudes, behavior, and culture (ABC) of organizations can prevent success.

    Using the “ABC of ICT” card deck and structured exercises, you can identify the ABCs common in your organizations and discover where you are at risk. You will also be able to compare the world-wide results of these exercises (to your results) and get tips and tricks on overcoming some of the most common issues identified through the exercises.

    Key Takeaways
  • Identify the attitudes, behaviors and cultural issues (ABCs) in your organization
  • Understand better how to identify risks with ITSM initiatives that come from the ABCs
  • Understand better how to relate to people outside of IT and work more closely with them
    • Successful alignment with the business is a critical piece of your ITSM program, but many of us are weak when it comes to reporting to the business in terms they understand. In this hands-on workshop, you will learn how to develop reports and analyses that enable you to represent the savings that result from your ITSM program.

    You will learn how to:
    The balanced scorecard depicts the health of the business in four important areas: customer, financial, internal processes, and knowledge and learning. What does IT contribute to enable the business to be successful in each area? This session will analyze the core IT processes that provide critical information to the business to help measure success and prove the value of IT to the business.

    Key Takeaways
    Justifying staffing should be an objective calculation based on the amount of work and the level of service provided. Learn how to use critical operational and service metrics to justify staffing levels and determine the level of service that the organization is capable of providing.

    This session will identify and explain which measurements are important, why they are important, and how to use them to communicate performance using a balanced scorecard.

    Key Takeaways
    Most people don’t really understand what the term “Quality of Experience” means, but all of us know how it feels when it is missing! In simple terms it means the emotional opinions a customer develops from using a service. These personal hopes and opinions affect loyalty, retention, purchase decisions, and the financial performance of your company. Quality of service (QoS) refers to the technical, operational aspects of a service: important (but insufficient) things like time to answer support calls, capacity, transport, etc. Quality of experience (QoE), on the other hand, is all about how the customer feels after using the service.

    Key Takeaways
  • See how emotions and social interactions are the basis of all customer quality–even for e-services!
  • Learn about inside-out and outside-in service quality measurement, and why you need both to meet customer expectations
  • Discover how ITIL guidance on strategy can help the business overcome challenges and seize opportunities in these uncertain times
    • The business wants to know that they can count on IT to continually meet the needs of the business. The IT Infrastructure Library (ITIL) and its philosophy of IT Service Management (ITSM) give us part of the picture, but what does IT really need to understand? This workshop will provide participants with a perspective on how to leverage concepts from Deming, Goldratt, and ITIL to better meet the needs of the business

    Key Takeaways
  • How to conceptualize strategic goals and tactical objectives
  • How to look for constraints, risks, and other issues while documenting objectives
  • Understanding requirements, measuring progress, and launching improvements via the service level management process
    • ITIL v3 offers some intriguing new insights into the measurement of quality, gap analysis, and establishing key performance indicators (KPIs) and other metrics. Join us to uncover what to measure, how to measure, and why to measure.

    Key Takeaways

    Tracks


    Frameworks: The Power of Multiple

    There is more to service management than ITIL. The key to your success is to understand the various frameworks and how you can adopt them to help optimize your service management program. These workshops will teach you how to prioritize business demand into project work, what you need to do to achieve effective, efficient, and economical service management processes.

    Sessions:

    Governance: Sharpen Your Business Focus

    Learn how IT Governance helps manage risk and creates confidence from the business that you serve. Discover how you can use COBIT to identify your process maturity, establish appropriate goals, and link your IT goals to business goals. Learn how you can build a service catalog with associated service costs and let clients decide what they’ll “buy” from you when you are asked to “do more with less”.

    Sessions:

    People: A Critical Resource

    Leaders are made, not born, and they actively adapt and change. Great leaders focus on honing their leadership skills and imparting those principles within their teams. This track provides leadership tips and techniques specific to service management professionals. Learn how you can create a high- performance culture that improves productivity, profitability, employee retention, and customer satisfaction.

    Sessions:

    Process Management: Essential for Success

    Ensure that your customers have access to the appropriate services to support the business functions. This track will help you understand the goals, objectives, activities, and relationships between service management processes. Learn how to overcome the challenges inherent in the implementation of service management processes which are essential for success.

    Sessions:

    Service Management: Master Key Concepts

    Learn from service management professionals who have “been there, done that” the concepts necessary for a successful SM program. Learn to establish what you do for whom, and why and how to value your IT services in business terms so you can prioritize and balance resource allocation and justify projects and activities. Discover ways to communicate the value and savings that result from your ITSM program.

    Sessions:

    Service Quality: Design, Measure, and Manage

    Customers – both internal and external – perceive service quality as a key determinate when reviewing and selecting service providers. Ensure that you are the service provider of choice by creating a proactive approach to service quality. Learn how to use the Balanced Scorecard and critical Operational & Service metrics, inside-out and outside-in service quality measurements, and how IT standards fit together.

    Sessions: