Digital Transformation of business has been one of the most common trends in the IT industry during the past few years as companies consider new ways to leverage and embed technology into their business processes.
From big data and IoT to cloud services and digitally-enabled user experiences, there is no question technology is changing quickly and having a tremendous impact on the business landscape. For IT departments, digital transformation can be somewhat problematic.
While IT professionals are elated that business users see the value of the technology about which they are so passionate and are using it in new and innovative ways, this trend puts a greater pressure on IT professionals to provide IT services that are always available, with the latest features and working together seamlessly to provide simple and intuitive user experiences.
(See, “ITSM in 2019: Are You Ready for Digital Transformation?”)
Consumer IT trends, particularly the ecosystem of mobile applications, have created an expectation about what it means to have technology-enabled business processes that many IT departments are not ready to deliver.
Most consumer IT experiences are rather new and rely on simple capabilities that work independently — an app for this, a web page for that, etc. Business-oriented IT environments and the capabilities they must support are far more complex.
As companies embark on the ITSM digital transformation journey, automation and technology -enabled experiences become more critical parts of how companies do business.
That can lead to significant productivity gains, but it also creates greater risk of technology failure impacting the business’s operational performance. For modern businesses, the technology just has to work. It is the job of your IT staff to make sure that happens.
Starting Point: Understanding What You Have
If you don’t understand what you have in your IT environment, then an IT asset discovery tool can be a great help for identifying IT assets. IT Configuration Management Database (CMDB) and IT Asset Management (ITAM) systems can provide the tools for aggregating components and mapping them to assemble the big picture of your IT environment.
(See, “Cover Your Assets: The Path Toward Digital Transformation”)
This insight enables you to make safe and effective changes, control IT costs, provide service assurance, and manage technology risks. These all depend on having a clear and complete understanding of what is in your environment and how the various pieces are connected.
Driving Informed Decision-Making
Collecting the information about your environment is only the first step. Sharing this information with leaders, analysts and operations staff who can use this information to drive business and technology decisions is where you start to see value created for your business.
In digitally enabled businesses, complete, current and accurate data is essential not only to understand system performance, but also business-process performance. This data helps leaders understand where capacity constraints exist, how consistently activities are occurring, and where changes are needed to improve business performance.
Enabling Consistent Improvement
The real-value of digital transformation is realized through incremental improvements that are made to systems and business processes during a period of time, and as issues are identified, decisions are made and the impact of their results are measured.
Having a clear picture of how your IT environment works enables continuous improvement cycles to occur at a faster pace and with more predictable results. Over time, this allows the business to become more agile, and respond to challenges and opportunities quicker — improving profitability and competitive advantage.
For IT professionals, digital transformation is both an exciting and a scary trend. With the right tools and information, like those from Virima, to help them understand the full breadth of the IT environment and manage it as it evolves, your team will be able to provide the responsive and dependable services your business users require.
Virima is an industry leader in IT Discovery, IT Asset Management (ITAM), and IT Service Management (ITSM) solutions to help your IT team manage and optimize your IT environment for peak performance.
Virima is here to help. To get started, contact us today to schedule a demo and explore the possibilities!
