What We Faced
Challenge
An IT Service Management (ITSM) team at a multi-national natural gas and electricity retailer used an IT service application for the management and delivery of IT services and support for their organization. Unfortunately, the company’s legacy IT service application was being decommissioned by the vendor, requiring the ITSM team to identify and select a new tool in short order. The company engaged MRE Consulting to plan, facilitate and execute the software selection process to enable the leadership team to decide on its new IT service management application. The company identified four potential solution vendors for evaluation and the process was to ensure that the selected IT service management software application would support the capabilities and requirements of the ITSM team to reach their target state.
What We Did
Solution
MRE Consulting led the end-to-end software selection process, facilitated by a comprehensive scorecard with multiple components: fit with requirements (Capability Model), demo criteria evaluation, and cost analysis matrix.
MRE started with the design of an IT service management Capability Model, informed by facilitating target state analysis workshops and leveraging MRE expertise with producing Capability Models. This enabled the ITSM team to identify their current state needs but also to define future needs for the long-term viability of the IT Service Management team. With the current and target state capabilities defined as Automation Management, Configuration Management, and Incident Management, MRE then facilitated a series of requirements gathering sessions with the ITSM, Human Resources and Legal teams.
With a list of vendors for evaluation, MRE led the process to engage with each vendor, providing each with a high-level scope and an invitation to participate in demos with the business teams. Demos provided the ITSM team an opportunity to evaluate each vendor’s application in-person and submit additional questions for clarification. Each demo participant from the client was provided a demo criteria scorecard to record objective numerical feedback and subjective feedback based on key requirements.
The Cost Analysis Matrix, built in collaboration with ITSM leadership, quantified the total cost of ownership over 12-, 16-, and 24-month timeframes to determine how implementation services, application costs, licensing and training compared from vendor to vendor. Vendor health was not a critical consideration as all applications and vendors were well-established market leaders without risk of decommissioning in the short-term.
What We Delivered
Results
Feedback gathered from the requirements gap analysis (Capability Model), demo criteria evaluation, and cost analysis matrix, were synthesized to a final scorecard ranking each vendor’s solution which yielded a landslide recommendation. The ITSM team shared that when the process started, they had not anticipated feeling as comfortable and confident making the vendor selection decision, but due to the approach led by MRE, methodology used, the outcome was a welcomed surprise to the team. The findings and final recommendation were made to leadership for approval.
Let's Talk
Related Insights
