Executive Summary

As technology disruption continues at an unprecedented pace, IT service delivery organizations are under significant pressure to respond to the rapidly changing environment and establish themselves as a strategic business enabler. IT organizations are expected to drive the adoption of next-generation IT, yet manage traditional systems with the utmost cost efficiency and agility. Therefore, they need to balance innovation with rigorous discipline. However, most IT organizations struggle to effectively meet these conflicting expectations, given the inherent inefficiencies in the traditional models of IT service delivery.

Most enterprises erroneously equate IT service delivery with IT support and, therefore, are unable to achieve optimization across the entire value chain. This suboptimal IT services approach impacts the ability of the enterprises to respond to the market demands in a timely manner, and raises questions on their ability to remain nimble, competitive, and relevant.

Everest Group research suggests that a large number of enterprises recognize this source of value erosion and are adopting remedial steps to optimize IT services. However, most efforts are piecemeal and, typically, focus on production support versus the entire Software Development Life Cycle (SDLC). These organizations continue to exhibit over reliance on human skills and “run by memory” in IT service delivery, which increases risks and compromises the user experience.

To achieve an optimized IT service delivery, enterprises must focus their efforts across the entire SDLC. The complexity across SDLC processes requires enterprises to leverage technology-driven initiatives that are not disjointed “point solutions” but deliver “end-to-end” services for the application lifecycle. Enterprises need to automate, industrialize, and digitize their processes to make them measurable and aligned to industry best practices.

Most discussions around IT service delivery optimization emphasize “cultural change” and “process overhaul” rather than pure technology. Our research suggests that though these are indeed important, they are difficult to implement and measure. Technology-driven IT service delivery optimization initiatives, on the other hand, are measurable and generate tangible results. However, these initiatives should not fundamentally disrupt ongoing IT service delivery. A strong focus on cross-team collaboration and reliance on technology versus scattered, fragmented, and inefficient processes residing in “team islands” will result in an optimized IT service delivery.

This report analyzes existing challenges in IT service delivery and suggest mitigation strategies to enable its optimization. The key areas of focus are:

• Key challenges in existing practices for IT service delivery
• Value erosion from suboptimal IT service delivery
• Role of technology across the SDLC to optimize IT service delivery
• Value and key success factors – technology-led IT service delivery optimization