User Experience

I am interested to read the response to this question and will be checking back. I recently completed ITIL Foundations training with many of my teammates at Extended Learning IT, and we have been talking about how this centralization process can be mapped to or assisted by the ITIL framework. One of the big takeaways for us was that a huge part of implementing ITIL successfully is understanding our organization’s and our customer’s requirements (although at the University it is a bit difficult to determine who the customer is!) Staying in touch with business needs and vision, and continually returning to those as services are designed, delivered, and improved seems key. We observe that our IT org seems to be in the “Service Strategy” phase of the lifecycle, which is the earliest stage.

You are right, Will, that connecting to what users need is key. Also understanding what will benefit the University as a whole. Open discussions would serve that end. I think your point highlights the fact that the Service Strategy phase needs to be thorough and thoughtful. Only then will the later stages of the process — cataloging services, defining and documenting processes, monitoring/measuring, improving, and more — add value to our org and our goals. I think ITIL does provide a framework for that, though, if well-implemented? Perhaps though, leadership is seeking other guidance. I am hoping that the somewhat open-ended plan presented will allow time and resources for Service Strategy to be well designed.

Best, Rosalind Benoit

Will & Rosalind,

You bring up an excellent point. Frameworks such as ITIL and recommendations from organizations such as HDI (Help desk Institute) are wonderful places for us to look to as we begin to identify methods of streamlining and making more efficient the services we provide. Before the TIG audit took place Andrea Rodgers reached out to several areas to discuss creating a help desk SLA that was based on HDI recommendations. The recommendations that were chosen were not perspective in nature and allowed areas that had help desks identify where in a spectrum they currently were at with efficiency and effectiveness and how, if they were so inclined, they could improve their system by identifying specific recommendations that they could pursue. It is important for us to remember in moving forward with any changes that frameworks are simply just that. We need to adapt and assess what parts of a framework will work best for UNM and how to apply them and to do that discussions on needs will continue to take place.

You are also both correct that no matter how efficient we make a system much of what our users also look to us for is a positive user experience. Much of that will come from positive communication and interactions with our user base and is something we should continue to strive for regardless of the changes made. On the communication side, discussions have already begun taking place based on feedback from the staff engagement session at tech days that emphasized a need for clearer, more frequent, communication with IT. It is also my hope with the way accountability is being built into the organization charts that it is encouraged that all IT staff are able to connect with the areas that they serve and not just provide an efficient service. These dialogues should continue not just within IT but between the ITO’s and the Deans and Directors that they serve with to ensure continuous positive interactions with IT staff.

Walter Winegar-Valdez

Will, thank you for starting a great thread!  You have captured a very important aspect of the work we are being asked to do. I like how you state the issue: “bridging the gap between technology and the services technology provides with the actual need of the user.”  ITIL is a fantastic framework and it lays a solid foundation for service delivery, when, as Rosalind points out, it is dynamically aligned to requirements, business needs and vision.  UNM’s adoption of ITIL really does set us up to deliver quality, repeatable services and to track and manage those services well.  As Walter states, it is still a framework.  When all is said and done, I agree with the thoughts I read here that we need to continue to improve the personal touch of working with individuals to truly understand needs and “own” issues together.  We have the right people to do this, and I look forward to working with the IT community to make it happen