Joel your question about unsuccessful ITIL implementations is a good one.   Although I can’t really provide any specific customer detail for a case study due to confidentiality, yet I can provide some overall insight and opinion based upon experience and other guidelines I’ve seen through industry analysts, scar tissue and the wisdom of others

In my opinion, the only real failures are those companies who choose “NOT” to adopt ITIL best practices.   Success improves from there.  That said, some companies embarking on this journey only achieve minimal levels of success.   In my view, ITIL implementations can struggle in a couple of key areas: 

1. Overall Program Management
2. Focus to Technology as the Solution  

Program ManagementITIL implementations are usually large and complex and solid Program/Project Management discipline is required.  Some companies start the struggle with grand plans based upon a huge scope and unreasonable expectations – then lack the organizational maturity (People & Process) to deliver to the expectations.  The desire for real, quick value can be overwhelming and must be balanced with the realization that this is a “journey”, not a “sprint”.   Getting strong sponsorship up front is critical.  Beginning with a true assessment, needs/gap analysis and identification of how to  lay a solid foundation while achieving quick wins with real business value can help  to avoid that “period of blame” that can quickly set in.  It’s kind of like building a house – or more specifically – like a large renovation and expansion project.   In the first year, you are laying a new/additional foundation with a huge amount of new or altered processes and changes in the culture.  Yet, you are living in the house at the same time, so you have to face up to the challenge to achieve/maintain  business value and sustain momentum until the roof is on, the carpet is in and the new areas are “livable”.    Your new foundation could possibly be a simple start in the area of things like “asset management” & then extending that to “Configuration Management” or by enabling some key wins in the areas of configuration management and incident/problem management with vision to move next  to release and change.    Bottom line:  start with a real baseline/foundation and build quick wins and value on that.    

Solid Program/Project Management with focus to project initiation (scope, sponsorship, communications) is a real help in this area.   Yet, sometimes, even those who drink the cool-aid and apply best project management practices struggle.   The best guidance I could provide for those struggling with current projects is:  revisit your roadmap, limit your scope and extend your project as best you can and always deliver with a business value mindset.  Even if you have a “failed” project in your lap, it may still be salvageable through recognition of the value you have already achieved, resetting expectations, re-aligning scope with business value, and re-visiting your tools, roadmaps and next steps.    

Technology Mindset - The root causes of failure to achieve expectations in ITIL implementations can be often be a misplaced focus to the “technical” rather than the people and processes.   It is not uncommon for the tool selection and purchase to come first (hey, there’s a glut of very good software sales teams out there).  While software plays a huge role in ITIL, a tool first approach can actually impede success.  To me, ITIL is not using best practices to use or manage technology - It’s about planning, executing and continuously improving a core set of processes to affect business outcomes.  The technology simply supports that.    I’ll sum it up like this…”would you buy a $10,000 lawn mower (tool) before you executed the process of obtaining financing, house-hunting and determining what type of property you even want.  Probably not… but it you did … would you then allow your lawnmower (tool) to drive the process of purchasing your home (location, financing, funding, etc…)?  What if you decide you want a condo?   Hello Craigslist! 

A solid CMDB is the key to any successful ITIL journey and there can be numerous speed bumps along the journey to a successful implementation.  Try not to think of a CMDB as a technology and definitive reference repository.  Rather consider it an overall set of processes, technology and culture designed to provide information to deliver business decisions and outcomes.   Some software vendors may try to espouse their CMDB as the definitive repository.   Try not to think of your CMDB as a single database.  Successful CMDB systems usually contain a variety of information and data in various repositories across your organization (known as “federated” data).    Relying on a single point of information sets you up for a slew of “data integrity and credibility” issues the first time your replicated data delivered from the single CMDB fuels incorrect decisions.  The key success factor here is to enable a comprehensive CMDB systems and processes that provide referential integrity and “metadata” pointing to the real,  “trusted sources” of the data where it resides – not trying to get it all in one place. 

Once you know where to get the real, trusted data and are able to refine your contextual mapping to business services, the challenge is to make transform the data to information and knowledge -  actionable to the decision making processes that consume it.

There are many other reasons that ITIL projects struggle… continue reading through Evergreen’s blogs, whitepapers and I’m sure you’ll find more… Hope this helps! 

Scott M. Davis Process Consultant

Evergreen Systems

512 983-6492

scott.davis@evergreensys.com