IT Service Management Trends 2012: The State of the Dev-Ops Union

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1 RESEARCH REPORT IT Service Management Trends 2012: The State of the Dev-Ops Union By Amita Abraham November 2012

2 Introduction IT service management (ITSM) is all about implementing and managing services that meet the needs of the business. The term service has gotten far more expansive in the last few years. Businesses no longer look to IT to deliver just break-fix services. As many of them shift to conducting business on-line, their IT organizations have been called upon to provide a new kind of service delivering and maintaining revenue-generating applications that are increasingly the face of the business. How did IT fare at servicing these applications in 2012? Serena Software conducted a survey at FUSION 12, the annual service management conference jointly hosted by itsmf USA and HDI in Dallas, Texas. 165 conference attendees shared their thoughts on the levels of maturity of ITSM processes and tools within their organizations. The survey also elicited responses around how the business viewed IT and how development and operations teams perceived each other within their organizations. The survey results indicate that it is time for organizations to take a more holistic approach to ITSM as prescribed by the five core publications in ITIL v3 - Service Strategy, Service Design, Service Transition, Service Operation, and Continual Service Improvement. In this new online world, it s all about Service Transition, rapidly delivering services required by the business into operational use, and that s exactly what s reflected in the survey results. The survey revealed people, process and system disconnects that can severely impact an enterprise s ability to rapidly deliver and maintain business-enabling applications. These disconnects are especially prevalent within development and operations organizations. Figure 1: Industry segmentation of respondents In terms of company size, more than 70% of the respondents came from organizations with greater than 2,000 employees. 85% of them were from organizations with more than 500 employees. Figure 2: Company size segmentation of respondents The roles of the respondents varied from individual contributors to executive management. 82% of the respondents were from IT; 65% identified themselves as IT management. About the Survey Respondents The survey respondents spanned several industries. More than 70% of the respondents were from four sectors - financial services, government, healthcare and IT. 20% of the respondents were from the financial services and insurance sector. The government and IT sectors each accounted for 19% of the respondents. 13% of the respondents were from the healthcare and pharmaceuticals sector. Figure 3: Role segmentation of respondents Serena Software, Inc. 1

3 Key Findings Enterprise IT continues to struggle with demonstrating to the business that they can rapidly deliver valuable services that meet their needs. The survey uncovered people, process and system disconnects across the service management life-cycle that contribute to IT s inability to stand up and be counted as a true business partner. The three key findings are as follows: 1. Business-IT and Dev-Ops distrust abounds. For many organizations that are transforming to on-line businesses, the application is the business. IT now has to deliver and maintain these customer-facing, always-on applications at the speed of agile. It is not enough that they deliver traditional break-fix services. To do this, development and operations teams need to be joined at the hip and have clear hand-offs and processes. The survey reflects the general distrust that exists between these teams which in turn impacts their ability to meet business needs and be valued as a true partner. 2. ITSM processes remain disconnected. Inconsistent and manual IT Service Management (ITSM) processes make it difficult for development and operations to collaborate and rapidly fulfill business requests. Despite the availability of a host of ITSM process frameworks and tools, a large number of enterprises have yet to define and automate core ITSM processes such as request management. The lack of a central place to submit and automatically get status updates on requests frustrates business users. While almost every facet of IT service management could do with better process integration, 72% of those surveyed stated that change and release management processes, that should ideally bring development and operations together to speed business change requests, were the least integrated and automated. ITIL v3 prescribes a more holistic approach to ITSM and Service Transition, one of its five core publications, calls for a focus on better change and release management processes to help rapidly deliver business-enabling services into operational use. According to the survey respondents, the top three challenges from silo-ed change and release management were as follows: Poor visibility into planned application and operational changes Unable to address change requests fast enough Unable to provide the business with accurate status updates on their requests 3. Limited use of tools to track change impact. Organizations continue to rely on , spread sheets and word of mouth to get insight into planned development or operational changes. Only 6% claim to have a shared release calendar across development and operations to ensure that changes do not fall through the cracks. The survey also revealed limited use of CMDBs within organizations to track the impact of both application as well operational changes. Business-IT Partnerships Needs Work The survey asked respondents how the business perceived IT within their organizations. Only 9% responded that the business views IT as completely aligned with its goals and as a true partner. One of the big shifts that we ve seen in recent years has been in the way organizations have increasingly moved towards conducting their business on-line. To support this new way of doing business, IT organizations have to be able to rapidly address their business counterparts demands for new or updated customer-facing applications or services that are always on. The survey indicates that IT organizations still have a ways to go before they are viewed as aligned with these new goals and perceived as a true business partner Serena Software, Inc. 2

4 IT is not viewed as a true partner Dev is not supportive of Ops goals Figure 4: Business view of IT Figure 6: Op s perception of Dev Dev-Ops Disconnects Abound In an effort to speed the delivery of applications and services, some development organizations have adopted agile methodologies. However, the goal of IT operations is to deploy these changes without introducing additional risk to their environments as a result of these changes. With poor hand-offs and limited visibility into what is coming down the chute from development, IT operations often puts the brakes on rollouts until they can vet out the impact of these changes for themselves. It is not surprising that the survey results reflect the general distrust that exists between these teams. Of the respondents that indicated that their organizations have adopted agile methodologies, 75% said that Ops is perceived to be a roadblock to or only somewhat supportive of agile development. Ops is seen as a roadblock to Agile The end result? The business is left clamoring for updates to their requests and dissatisfied with IT. It is immaterial to them whether the problem lies within the development or operations organization or somewhere in between. Dev-Ops disconnects severely impact enterprise agility. Exploring the levels of maturity of ITSM processes and the adoptions of tools within organizations sheds additional light on the reasons for disconnects between development and operations teams. Lack of ITSM Process Maturity Inconsistent and manual IT Service Management (ITSM) processes make it difficult for Dev and Ops to collaborate and rapidly fulfill business requests. Despite the availability of a host of ITSM process frameworks and tools, a large number of enterprises have yet to define and automate core ITSM processes. Figure 5: Dev s perception of Ops Likewise, 72% said that development is perceived as not supportive or only somewhat supportive of IT operations goals. 56% indicated that their organizations were yet to define and automate request management. The lack of a single place for business users to submit requests and automatically get status updates results in further discontent with IT. While enterprises have automated incident and change management to a large degree, interestingly enough, few have invested in triaging incidents and defining and automating problem management. Over 70% indicated that they had poor release management processes. Given Serena Software, Inc. 3

5 that release management results in the highest number of touch points between Dev and Ops, inconsistent and manual processes exacerbates the Dev-Ops disconnect. ITSM processes are inconsistent and manual Poor visibility into planned application and operational changes An inability to address change requests fast enough Unable to provide the business with accurate status updates on their requests Change and release management is the weak link Figure 7: ITSM process maturity within organizations Multiple Process Disconnects While almost every facet of IT service management could do with better process integration, 72% of those surveyed stated that change and release management processes that should ideally bring Dev and Ops together to speed business change requests were the least integrated and automated. Change and release management isn t integrated Figure 9: Top challenges with change and release management Limited Visibility into Changes and Impact Organizations continue to rely on , spread sheets and word of mouth to get insight into planned development or operational changes. 60% of those surveyed indicated little to no visibility into planned changes. And only 6% claim to have a shared release calendar across development and operations to ensure that changes do not fall through the cracks. Enterprises have poor visibility into changes Figure 8: ITSM process integration within organizations Change and Release Management Challenges An overwhelming 92% of those surveyed indicated challenges with change and release management, the key processes related to Service Transition as described by ITIL. The top three challenges from siloed change and release management were as follows: Figure 10: Visibility into Dev and Ops changes Over 50% surveyed indicated limited to no use of a Configuration Management Database (CMDB). Only 16% of those surveyed said that they used a CMDB to analyze the impact of changes they made to infrastructure. Only 10% Serena Software, Inc. 4

6 claimed to use their CMDB for application change impact analysis. Very few organizations appear to be in a position to be able to easily track the impact of both application as well as infrastructure changes. CMDBs are in limited use Figure 11: CMDB usage within organizations Summary and Recommendations The application is the business for the many organizations that are transforming into on-line businesses. The definition of service management is expanding to encompass the delivery and maintenance of these businessenabling applications and services. In this new on-line world, it s all about Service Transition as prescribed by ITIL v3 - rapidly delivering business-enabling services into operational use - and that s exactly what s reflected in the survey results. Inconsistent and manual IT Service Management (ITSM) processes continue to plague development and operations efforts to rapidly fulfill business requests. 56% of those surveyed indicated that their request management processes were ill defined or manual. Of those that reported issues with change and release management, 25% said they had trouble providing the business with accurate status updates. Consider implementing a unified request center to serve as the single place for all requests and updates to the business. Almost every phase of IT service management could do with better process integration. However, change and release management processes, central to Service Transition as described in ITIL v3, appear to need the most attention. 72% of those surveyed stated that these processes that should ideally bring development and operations together to speed business change requests were the least integrated and automated. Consider automation to reduce missed steps and miscommunication. Organizations continue to rely on , spread sheets and word of mouth to get insight into planned development or operational changes. This impacts their ability to provide their business counterparts with accurate updates. A shared release calendar and CMDB accessible to both development and operations can help IT provide greater visibility into changes and their impact to all stakeholders Serena Software, Inc. 5

7 Appendix The Serena survey was conducted in October 2012 using the online polling technologies from isurvey at FUSION 12, the annual service management conference jointly hosted by itsmf USA and HDI in Dallas, Texas. The survey was promoted to attendees via conference-specific s and promotions, Twitter, the Serena xpress newsletter and at the Serena booth. Surveys were completed at the Serena booth using ipads. All respondents had the option to submit their responses anonymously. Survey respondents were also entered in to a drawing to win a Google Nexus tablet. A total of 165 respondents filled out the survey, and the complete results of responses are available upon request Serena Software, Inc. 6 Copyright 2012 Serena Software, Inc. All rights reserved. Serena is a registered trademark of Serena Software, Inc. All other product or company names are used for identification purposes only, and may be trademarks of their respective owners. Revised 16 November Document ID: WP-ITSM