Implementing ITIL® - the Importance of Servant Leaders
Introduction
This post has been composed through my own personal knowledge and experience as an ITIL® trainer, combined with real-life experience in the workplace. In other words, I have not simply copied and pasted from a textbook.
Situation Analysis
Those company organisations who thought by assigning their employees to undertake ITIL® training the business would in turn automatically reap the benefits will have already realised that this is far from the truth. Unless the purpose was to achieve more cosmetic and indirect business benefits then the end-result is almost likely to be disappointing. Unless however, the correct infrastructure and strategy exists for those employees returning to the workplace after class.
Without the correct infrastructure and strategy, we will see short bursts of self-motivated initiatives however, these will be short-lived. We will see people flirt with designing and partially implementing things in silos until their enthusiasm eventually wears thin through the lack of collaboration (e.g., common goals and objectives).
Without the correct infrastructure and strategy people will ‘talk the talk’ but not ‘walk the walk’, meaning those people who support such principles with just words from the textbook without action.
Without the correct infrastructure and strategy those who fail their ITIL exam, may end up resenting ITIL, and potentially localising such resentment within the team.
Without the correct infrastructure and strategy organisations will expose themselves to losing any knowledge gained in the event of employees leaving the company.
The issues highlighted lie with those organisations who are unable to embed and institutionalise such principles through failing to create global visibility (e.g., organisation-wide). These organisations will be left with,
a sense of failure to meet the desired results
the realisation of the costs associated with such failures
questions being asked as to whether ITIL does what it claims to do?
So, how can an organisation establish the correct infrastructure and strategy and in turn, capture and maintain such principles, methodologies and practices learnt in the classroom?
Whilst there are several key factors however, one significant contributor falls within the dimension ‘Organisations and People’, particularly roles. I have composed an example template based on a Roles and Responsibilities Policy, this is on the Digital Shop
As a starting point, we need to either redefine the term manager’ to servant leader or differentiate managers from servant leaders. Meaning, regardless of title, seniority or executive decision-making, we must introduce and promote servant leaders.
So, what is a servant leader? In the context of IT service management (ITSM), servant leaders are strong advocators of ITSM, servant leaders are not managers. It is recommended therefore, to identify individuals to assume the role of servant leader (see key attributes below). It is also recommended to introduce servant leaders in numbers proportionate to the organisation. This approach will quickly gain traction and popularity and in turn overcome any resistance to any necessary cultural changes.
Key points/attributes of servant leaders:
Servant leaders become the glue’ which bond collaborative thinking and working. Typically, a servant leader is not a full-time role however, when in a servant leader role, servant leaders think and act organisation wide, not just in the interest of the team which they represent. Simply put, servant leaders think and act globally not just locally.
Servant leaders become the central point of contact regarding a particular ITSM topic area and by default, are dedicated, committed, and passionate about their topic area. Servant leaders educate and facilitate, and above all servant leaders promote the qualities that people bond with and comfortable expressing themselves. Servant leaders in comparison are like members of parliament, or more specifically, they become members of the service management office (SMO). The SMO provides a central channel and becomes the centre of excellence for service management.
Servant leaders are not managers, albeit a manager can also be a servant leader however, these are clearly two separate roles. Servant leaders are not police officers or inspectors, unlike managers, servant leaders do not promote hierarchical power. In simple terms, in a servant leader role, when a manager walks into a room, they should leave their manager title/status outside the room.
Whilst servant leaders will use the textbook as guidance they will transform such explicit knowledge into business context and meaning, relevant to our organisation's brand, products and services.