Service management is a part of business applications, and it is undergoing huge and rapid changes. But what exactly is this “service management”?
Definition of service management
Matthieu de Montvallon of ServiceNow France (one of the largest publishers in the field) defines it as an “intermediary”, that is, “everything that happens between an actor in need and an actor who provides answers.” For example, between an employee’s request to purchase a new PC and its delivery.
Between the two, the request must go through the manager (verification), accountant (funding it), supply (order) and even IT (preparation and protection of equipment). If it is the arrival of an employee, we can add HR (and determine whether he has the right to perform a specific job according to his position in the hierarchy).
It was ITSM at the beginning
Therefore, the service management editor will “equip everything that happens between demand and supply,” whether for a given, equipment or intangible service-Mathieu de Montvalon continues.
Historically, the IT department was the first to automate the triple process of processing requests (via help desk, portal, or ticketing), “cutting” requests, and transferring funds. To the relevant departments.
The tools supporting these requests are grouped together under the name ITSM (IT Service Management). “It’s a bit general, we put all the service management processes that affect IT in it,” Matthieu de Montvallon concludes.
ESM in ITSM (and BPM) continuity
In 2017, a second quite similar concept emerged:Harmless management Pour into enterprise service management.
Participants in this new category logically come from ITSM-ServiceNow, BMC, and Micro Focus-but more recently also from project management, such as Atlassian’s Jira Service Desk.
“This way of handling service requests is the same everywhere. […] The key point of understanding is that we can make hybrid boxes. ”
Matthew de MontvalonFrance now serves
ESM applies the same principles as ITSM to processes outside of IT, such as service catalogs.
“Logically, this way of handling service requests is the same everywhere: whether you are an employee talking to HR, the legal department, or a customer talking to a supplier,” Matthieu de Montvallon explains. “Yes. The way the process is modeled, orchestrated, decomposed into sub-processes, and called different partners is always the same.”
For example, ServiceNow has diversified into “Human Resource Service Delivery” and “Customer Service Management” in the past few years. Unlike the HRIS or CRM with which they interact, these tools are not limited to HR or customer relationships.
“We were able to arrange several transactions in parallel for the solution [d’une demande] Use a real workflow engine” to differentiate ServiceNow experts. “Imagine a customer “box” that is broken down into several “sub-boxes”: one sent to law, another to procurement, and one to technology; and [derrière] You must trigger on-site intervention through on-site service”.
All in all, ESM is horizontal, so it is closer to BPM than CRM or HRIS. “The key to understanding is that we can make a’hybrid box’. The employee doesn’t care whether his request is handled by this service or that service. Human Resource Management System [ou un CRM] I don’t know how to do this alone. It goes far beyond the gate,” insisted Matthew de Montvalon.
ESM, the next generation business application
For Charles Betz of Forrester Research, ESM is “the next generation of true enterprise solutions.”
“It’s a bit like a single emergency call number (such as 911 in the US), but in business.”
Charles BatesForrest Research
According to the Forrester Wave 2019 on this topic, the ESM market started to become truly solid in 2019, when all publishers began to support non-IT features.
For example, in France, EasyVista customers such as the Hauts-de-Seine departmental committee will extend the scope of the ITSM platform to their general resources in 2021. In another example, the collective catering group Elior has been using ITSM from Paris publishers since 2014. In 2018, it also expanded the platform to logistics and finance beyond IT to increase its supplier cash.
Forrester still believes that artificial intelligence and machine learning injected into ITSM should further stimulate the ESM market.
Nevertheless, this market is still forming, Charles Bates warned. He believes that, eventually, ITSM and ESM can even be merged into a single service catalog.
“These tools answer [en effet] It’s all the same: Let employees just raise their hands and say “Hey, I need help here” to get the answer,” he said for example. “It’s kind of like a single emergency number (such as 911 in the US), but in In business. Whether your problem is a leaking faucet, a software error, or a broken phone, it doesn’t matter. You will have an organization that integrates and shares services”.
New “giant” entrants and merger announced
Due to the strong expansion of ESM—for example, ServiceNow’s turnover has more than tripled in three years (US$4.5 billion in 2020 and US$1.9 billion in 2017)—there is a risk of “stimulating new appetite” in this market (e.g. IFS), where ITSM does not necessarily attract “big” publishers.
“We can expect the arrival of new heavyweights in business software and integration,” Charles Betz confirmed. “Sooner or later, Oracle and SAP will have to give it a go,” he predicted. “There, things will become very interesting.”
With colleagues from Search IT Operations (TechTarget group, owner of MagIT)
