When asked about top IT Service Management (ITSM) trends, expansion into other departments through Enterprise Service Management (ESM), along with digital transformation, topped the list in a survey conducted by Information Week.
While there are many different ESM solutions in the market, not all of them have the same features and capabilities. In this blog post, we will discuss three must-have features that your ESM solution should have in order for you to succeed. They fall into the following categories: automation, scalability and ease of use.
If you’re looking for an ESM solution that can help your organization manage its services more effectively, be sure to keep these three features in mind.
Defining Enterprise Service Management and Its Benefits
Enterprise Service Management (ESM) is an emerging approach to business operations that puts the end-user experience at the heart of decision-making.
Combined with modern technology and data analytics, ESM seeks to improve proactive issue resolution and empower employees to create memorable user experiences.
ESM aims to streamline processes, allow employees to quickly understand how decisions are made and provide customers and employees with better outcomes. By optimizing employee services through departmental portals, businesses can increase productivity and accuracy while providing top-notch customer service.
In short, ESM is an invaluable tool for businesses seeking the highest quality customer experience possible.
To successfully implement an ESM platform throughout an organization, you need to think through use cases for each department and not assume everyone uses the same language and processes.
To be successful, each group or department needs a purpose-built solution. Simply taking your ITSM platform and trying to duplicate it across your organization won’t work. Each department needs to be able to ideate and create its own service solution WITHOUT dependency on IT. For this, you likely need a codeless platform.
If marketing wants to add a new service to the catalog, or a new request type or wants to create new content in the knowledge base – they should be able to do so without using IT resources. The goal of a good ESM platform is to be easy to use, easy to own and easy to operate.
Three Essential Features of Enterprise Service Management Software
Enterprise Service Management software is quickly becoming a go-to tool for any business that is looking to maximize efficiency and reduce operating costs because it gives companies the tools and mechanisms they need to ensure they’re solving customer (and employee) problems efficiently and productively.
Three essential features of effective ESM tools are automation, reporting and no-code functionality.
Automation can streamline processes by minimizing manual labor and help ensure compliance with regulatory standards.
Comprehensive reporting allows for a simple analysis of team performance and ensures that high-quality service is delivered efficiently and on time.
Finally, a no-code ESM platform empowers users by allowing them to tailor their self-service portals, forms and processes to meet their specific needs.
By leveraging these features, organizations can benefit from improved productivity, increased reliability, faster response times, and scalability as needed.
What ESM Looks Like Outside of IT
With the right codeless service management tool – everyone from IT to HR, facilities to marketing can set up their own customized portals and workflows with automation to handle requests – whether that’s for a name change of new hire onboarding in HR, or a new work order or maintenance request in facilities for example.
In HR, you can use an ESM tool to handle service requests and workflows using a customized, branded portal that allows employees to select a specific service and the platform will automatically route the request in the right direction—things like requests to onboard/offboard a new employee, to initiate an FMLA request, name changes or even employment verification can be entered and managed through the portal.
In addition, the HR portal can have a knowledge base that houses all forms, documents and procedures that people within the company need access to.
In marketing, an ESM platform can be used to save time and stay organized. Anyone in marketing knows requests are always coming in from multiple departments. Those requests can range from mass emails to events, to communications, and more. The sheer volume of activity can be daunting – especially in larger organizations and businesses. And without formal a intake process and project planning/tracking – things can get lost.
Using an ESM platform, marketing can create a portal and have anyone with a request fill out a project form. This form can be routed to the appropriate person within marketing and they can create a ticket, or even a project, and track progress within the platform.
In addition, the portal can work as a central repository for all marketing collateral. Anyone needing a brochure, video, presentation or other marketing materials can come to the portal and find it themselves instead of sending an email request. And if that marketing material doesn’t exist, they can fill out a form on the portal to request its creation.
As you can see, ESM can be a great addition to an organization. But in order to succeed, you need to get buy-in from everyone involved. In addition, when contemplating your ESM strategy, it’s important to consider the different ways you can combine your ESM with Project Portfolio Management and an integration and automation tool like iPaaS (integration platform as a service) to extend ESM even further.
ESM In Action
Expansion to ESM can be a critical part of digital transformation for an organization. Especially when you invest in an ESM platform that includes automation and integration capabilities.
Casino Arizona and Talking Stick Resort, have been using ESM for years and just recently switched to TeamDynamix ESM after outgrowing their previous ESM solution.
Independently owned and operated by the Salt River Pima-Maricopa Indian Community in Scottsdale, Arizona, these casino and resort properties employ about 3,500 people altogether. For more than a decade, they’ve benefited from having a “one-stop” service portal that employees could use to request everything from housekeeping services to clean a room before a special event, to the purchase and provisioning of new technology or a security badge for a visiting vendor.
However, the legacy ESM solution these properties were using had serious limitations. For instance, there wasn’t a way for employees to log into the system remotely from a smartphone or other mobile device to track or make service requests on the go. What’s more, making changes to the system’s configuration involved expensive updates to the software’s code.
“Our legacy platform didn’t have the flexibility to grow along with us as our needs evolved,” Program Manager, Adam Dunn, said.
In looking for a new ESM platform, Casino Arizona and Talking Stick Resort wanted the ability to configure the system easily and make changes flexibly and dynamically. “We looked at a number of systems,” Dunn said. “In TeamDynamix, we found the one that was most user-friendly.”
With its “low-code, no-code” design, TeamDynamix is highly configurable, allowing organizations to create personalized service categories (both simple and complex) and build customized workflows for managing multistep processes.
In addition, the platform’s enterprise Integration and automation capabilities allow IT staff to create customized integrations between TeamDynamix and other software programs using a simple, drag-and-drop flow builder. And because TeamDynamix is easy to use and configure, it lends itself nicely to ESM and can be easily adopted by departments outside of IT.
Phase one of the properties’ implementation of TeamDynamix has involved the IT and AV departments. Phase two includes housekeeping and security.
In housekeeping, for example, one of the areas the tool will be used to help with is resource capacity planning around events.
“We have an event space where we host a variety of different things,” Dunn said. “We’ll be using the tool to get out in front of these and schedule housekeeping for room cleanings before and after these events. All of these housekeeping requests can be scheduled and managed through a ticket. This allows our housekeeping department to see what events are upcoming that they need to plan for and staff appropriately. And if we have a performer coming into our nightclubs, a lot of times housekeeping is tasked with clearing space, so they can see when those requests come in and make sure the right resources are available.”
Want to learn more about Enterprise Service Management and hear from organizations that are finding success with ESM? Check out the latest ESM eBook: Enterprise Service Management – Key Lessons and Best Practices