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Expanding the Potential of IT Service Management with SIAM™️

Expanding the Potential of IT Service Management with SIAM™️

Сourse attended
EXIN BCS Certified SIAM™️ Training

Ms. Noriko Takata

　Interest in SIAM™ (Service Integration and Management) is growing in North America, Europe, and Japan. SIAM ™ is a Body of Knowledge (BoK) for integrating and managing services from multiple service providers. The goal is to provide services appropriate to each company’s business in a timely manner.

　Today, many enterprises are trying to build IT environments that combine services from various service providers, such as cloud services, IT outsourcing, communications, service desks, and managed services. It is no exaggeration to say that how to manage increasingly complex multi-provider environments is one of the most critical issues an IT organization must solve.

　ITIL® is a well-known set of IT service management practices. ITIL ® , however, is mainly for IT service quality management at a single service provider. It is not suited for IT service management in a multi-service provider environment. SIAM™, therefore, has recently become a prominent new management practice, especially outside Japan.

　A critical feature of SIAM™ is that it enables governance of multiple IT services in line with enterprises’ strategic policies and establishes a flexible ecosystem that optimizes resources. In environments where large numbers of service providers are crowded together, more enterprises are watching SIAM™ as a means of integrating services while optimizing costs and resources.

Sounding out SIAM™’s potential and future prospects from an ITIL® Master’s perspective

　ITIL® and SIAM ™ cannot be practiced separately, because SIAM ™ was developed based on ITIL ® . Within individual service providers, ITIL® remains the basis of management, while SIAM™ is used to integrate and manage multiple service providers. This is an important point to remember about IT service management going forward.

　SIAM™ is a service management framework for multi-sourcing environments that may extend to governance, integration, coordination, assurance, and end-to-end service management, among others. A roadmap has been proposed for transitioning from the current ITIL® -based operating model to a SIAM ™ model. SIAM™, moreover, may be considered a framework with established process and practice only when there is communication, collaboration, and cooperation between multiple service providers.

　Thus, the number of persons seeking SIAM ™ certification in Japan is poised to grow as SIAM ™ gets recognized as a management framework that, when combined with ITIL® , is adapted for multiple service provider environments.

　In this issue, we meet Noriko Takata, the sole ITIL ® Master in Japan. Ms. Takata currently works as the Head of Service Management in the Global IT Department at Takeda Pharmaceutical Company Limited. Her roles include negotiating contracts with outsourcing vendors and managing Takeda’s service improvement program. Ms. Takata took ePlugOne’s SIAM ™ Professional Training to learn how to better manage today’s environments. In this interview, she discusses the differences between ITIL ® and SIAM ™, how they are used, and their potential for the future, all from her perspective as an ITIL® Master.

What motivated you to take the SIAM™ Professional Training?

　I had already taken the SIAM™ Foundation training, so I understood the basic concepts and terminology. But when I started thinking about adopting SIAM™ by myself, I realized that my understanding from the Foundation level was not deep enough. It seems that many enterprises get a consultant’s support when implementing SIAM™, but I didn’t want to be completely dependent on a consultant. I wanted to take the lead in establishing a strategy and putting SIAM™ into practice. I knew I would need a deeper understand - ing to do that, so I took the Professional training. Digging deeper into the things I wanted to learn help me expand my knowledge further.

People who take the SIAM™ Professional Training learn SIAM™ practice by using global-scale case studies. How did your SIAM™ training differ from the ITIL ® V2 service manager training you once took?

　As I recall, ITIL ® V2 service manager training focused on learning each process with an awareness of its purpose. SIAM ™ training, however, brings together all the things that were previously subdivided. It impressed me with the importance of integration.

　SIAM™ is a framework that can only work where communication and collaboration effectively exist. The thing that’s different from ITIL® V2 is that with SIAM™, you must first understand the process. Then you can determine a basic strategic policy and build a comprehensive management model suited to the particular enterprise.

　Even as I was learning, there were many things I came to understand keeping in mind the environment in which I was working, and I think that’s why we now have a framework suited to our current environment.

The development of the internet and cloud services is a big feature of IT environments today, which are completely different from the environments of fifteen years or more ago. Do you think SIAM™ and ITIL® will be further enhanced to keep up with the times?

　I personally feel they are already changing. The focus on strategy really fits the times, especially the way these systems clar ify customer responsibility and emphasize customer satisfaction. Enterprises want to know if they can rapidly build timely, flexible ecosystems for their customers. And they have to think about whether the functions that ITIL® cannot provide by itself can be reflected in their business as value. Putting systems and schemes in place for doing so is going to be the key to making good use of SIAM ™ "hereafter.

You are the only ITIL® Master in Japan. What makes SIAM™ so appealing?

　As long as you are just doing simple quality management tasks, anyone can learn ITIL ® regardless of experience. However, when you start doing a variety of tasks in a multi-provider environment with an ITIL® base, you really need SIAM ™. Unless you’ ve tried building a process by yourself based on ITIL ® and had the feeling that something is missing, you won’ t really appreciate the benefits of SIAM™.

　A big feature of SIAM™ is that the answer you get will vary depending on the enterprise’ s strategy, environment, and priorities. Using SIAM ™ will teach you how to find the correct answer, but it won’ t tell you what the correct answer is. What I like about SIAM™ is that there is never just one answer. That’s also one of the challenges, but it’s fun to seek out a better-fitting model for each case.

　I think that for many people starting to learn SIAM™, there’s a tendency to collect case studies, but I don’t think that’s always necessary. A case study is yesterday’ s news. With SIAM ™ you don’ t try to fit old answers into your organization; you build an answer within the organization. SIAM™ can find a fit for any company, so it’ s important to seek a solution for yourself rather than get stuck on case studies.

What do you think is SIAM™ ’s benefit and value for enterprises doing business in a multi-provider environment?

　First, the great value is in defining the retained capabilities, those capabilities retained by the customer organization. It is extremely important and beneficial for customer organizations to recognize what capabilities to remain in their organization as a strategy. There are still not very many enterprises really thinking about this. When we are engaging in contract management, architecture, or roadmaps, for example, we still do not have many opportunities to think for ourselves about the meaning of this work we are doing and whta we expect to get out of it. When we are establishing a strategy, we should be thinking about these things simultaneously, but in fact that rarely happens. The value of SIAM ™ is that it really emphasizes these points and draws our attention to them.

For what kinds of issues is it useful to practice SIAM™-based multi-provider environment service management? And what is likely to happen if an enterprise incorporates the SIAM™ Body of Knowledge (BoK) into its business?

　In the case I’ m thinking of, SIAM ™ gives you the opportunity to reconsider those tasks that have always been a black box to you because you outsourced them. There are things you have to do if you wish to practice end-to-end management, and there are challenges you can’ t see until you finally dismantle your black boxes. SIAM ™ helps you get these in order so you can visualize new challenges. That’ s indispensable nowadays for the sake of service accountability and the practice of end-to-end service.

　And I really like the concept of taking the best-of-breed, that is, the best combination, from increasingly complex IT services and optimizing their onboarding and offboarding. Now, an organization may decide to give the best-of-breed approach a try, but find that it’ s not so easy. But SIAM ™, I felt, is a framework that makes it easier. There are also difficult and troublesome aspects about onboarding and offboarding suppliers, so in many cases enterprises tend to be passive about replacing vendors. But SIAM ™ gives you a framework that emboldens you to make up your mind and make some changes, and that’ s wonderful. In short, there are some things that have to be closely retained even on the customer organization internally side and knowledge and skills that they need to have. Even on the customer organization internally side, there is the risk that a service provider suddenly goes out of busines s and a new service can’ t be established right away. You could say that SIAM ™ creates a lot of value by keeping a sense of tension in a balanced relationship with the service provider side.

What impact do you think the role of service integrators with a SIAM™ model and SIAM™ ecosystems will have on Japan’s IT environment going forward?

　Around the globe, it seems there are a lot of enterprises trying SIAM™ in one way or another, but to be honest, it will probably take a bit more time to spread in Japan. For a time, there will be a lot of enterprises outsourcing the service integrator role. That’s because in Japan the relationships between customers, vendors, system integrators, and others are different than in other countries, so one factor will be how to shake that up. I think that if enterprises were to adopt a SIAM™ model, the model that would prevail would be for the lead supplier as service integrator to implement the SIAM™ model starting with its vendors. The question for Japan at this time, however, is how many vendors there are that can offer support in terms of both experience and knowledge if an enterprise decided it wanted to try SIAM™. I think people are interested, but the providers and consultants need to establish business models, while for end users, implementing ITIL® and service management tools is of more importance. It will take some time before any enterprises emerge that can say “we integrate it all in-house.”

　Moreover, if just one or two teams in an organization decided they want to implement SIAM™, it’s hard to achieve that goal unless management is committed. In other words, unless the teams and providers have reached a certain baseline maturity, it’s hard to do it all. Unless an organization has mature capabilities, playing the role of integrator is going to be very difficult. But this is what I want to try to accomplish going forward.

How do your SIAM™ efforts challenge you and allow you to delight in growth?

　My company, Takeda Pharmaceutical, has not yet comprehensively implemented SIAM ™, but I believe that in many areas we are partially covered. Our next challenge will be to get from there to true integration and establish a SIAM™ model that will involve our customers. Once we do that, it will be really delightful, as well as an opportunity for us as an organization to increase our capabilities. I feel really motivated to make a business case for a SIAM ™ project and learn things for myself as I take on new challenges. If I can get my own team and the service management team to take this on, it would be a lot of fun for me to provide the support. I myself don’t need to lead the effort, but I would like to use my experience and knowledge of SIAM™ to advise and support others and help the other members grow. This came up in the training, but the service integrator plays a key role in coordination and collaboration, so it’s hard to quantify the benefits. There is a different understanding of what “win-win” means for each role. As I imagine what the process will be like until SIAM™ gets firmly established, I know there will be difficulties, but I feel it will really be worthwhile.

Thank you for your cooperation

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