Long regarded as a set of practices and solutions to ensure that technology best meets the needs of users, the IT service management function has evolved to become the vehicle that delivers value in today’s emerging digital enterprise. IT service teams are under a constant strain to render quality services, 24/7, with existing or even fewer resources—all the while dealing with the complexity of rapidly changing business needs in today’s digital ecosystem. Added to that, the necessity to reduce downtime adds insult to injury. That being so, the IT service management (ITSM) paradigm is witnessing significant innovations in terms of advanced solutions that can address enterprise needs beyond IT. However, ITSM implementations tend to be expensive, and C-level management strives to achieve adequate ROI on ITIL certifications and ITSM tooling. Both the tool maintenance and running maintenance costs (i.e., subscription and configuration) pose significant concerns for organizations. Besides, ITSM tools must adapt to a quickly changing landscape characterized by additional cloud services, BYOD challenges, DevOps, and a decreased focus on ITIL.

Against this backdrop of pressing challenges that beset the industry, ITSM Company—a committed Microsoft Partner—stands out as the obvious choice for organizations that seek to consolidate their enterprise tools. ITSM Company’s flagship solution, ITSM360, offers a unique way of powering ITSM processes based on the Microsoft technology stack. “Our baseline for ITSM tooling is SharePoint, with ITSM360 running natively in that environment. This enables us to leverage our clients’ existing Microsoft subscriptions, resulting in a significantly lower upfront cost,” explains Tina Sønderup Heinze, CEO of ITSM Company.

Empower Your Business with ITSM360

As a complete and mature ITSM solution powered by Microsoft technology, ITSM360 runs natively in SharePoint and Office 365 environments, which enables customers to enjoy data storage, security, compliance, and process capabilities without making additional purchases. By leveraging existing subscriptions—80 percent of Fortune 500 companies use SharePoint—and standardized Microsoft workflows, companies can quickly get up and running with ITSM360 at a significantly reduced cost. In terms of adaptation, ITSM360 is designed from the ground up to be a flexible solution. Built-in scalability and a flexible design ensure that users can customize their IT processes through a variety of integration-friendly options. This includes leveraging tools within the Microsoft ecosystem (such as Flow, SP Designer), implementing Visual Studio’s capabilities, and even other third-party tools. Working seamlessly with the Microsoft ecosystem, ITSM Company ensures that third-party applications can be easily integrated with its solution framework.

As customers can use their own Microsoft tenant, the established governance settings from Azure/Office 365 are automatically applied to ITSM360, making it one of the most secure ITSM platforms in the industry.

Besides, with ITSM360, integrating with company data is straightforward in SharePoint due to multiple integration points, such as Microsoft Graph, SharePoint APIs, and Flow. Seamless integration of ITSM360 with the Microsoft ecosystem means that companies have access to innovative services, such as the Microsoft Bot Framework and Microsoft AI.

In terms of implementation, ITSM Company empowers customers with the freedom to implement the solution according to their unique needs, terms, and demands. The firm’s platform is wholly aligned with Microsoft technology, from UI/UX to product family integration. This standardized approach enables clients to work with local/existing Microsoft providers to facilitate the implementation of ITSM360 or, if the resources exist in-house, to implement the platform themselves. “Alternatively, businesses can work with our partners, Microsoft professional services, or directly with us. We enable our customers to implement ITSM360 even remotely all over the world from our office in Copenhagen,” stresses Tina.

For ITSM Company, a typical client engagement begins with the development of a service catalog—the essential link between what is expected of the IT organization and what is demanded by the business. It defines what IT does for the business and conveys exactly what a user can expect from colleagues within an IT Department. Tina emphasizes that a service catalog is a fundamental component for every business, and best-in-class enterprises use the IT service catalog for continuous improvement, and BPM processes (KPIs and metrics are linked to the catalog to facilitate these processes). As such, while beginning a new relationship with a client—before deploying the platform—the ITSM implementation team discusses the IT service catalog in order to fully understand the client’s organization and its IT department. This, in turn, enables the team to determine the relative maturity of the client’s existing IT processes and proceed accordingly.

The Pillars of Success

ITSM Company attributes its success primarily to two groups of people: ITIL/service management experts and Microsoft geeks. While the former hold extensive experience in ITSM as a discipline, the latter is characterized by real-world experience in building solutions on top of SharePoint and is able to successfully convey their expertise in collaboration, process, and knowledge sharing. Both groups have contributed significantly to propelling ITSM Company towards the realization of its vision of IT Service Management and its role within the Microsoft ecosystem. Tina goes on to mention that the catalyst for the company’s origin stemmed from a group of Nordic organizations that were seeking an easier way to implement ITSM in their respective businesses.

The core baseline of ITSM360 is the ITIL process framework that reflects a common understanding for all ITSM professionals.

Perfectly aligned with Microsoft SharePoint, ITSM360 features content and pre-defined processes that are ITIL-based—primarily service request fulfilment, incident management, change management, release management, and configuration management. Moreover, ITSM360 can be refined using solutions such as Microsoft Flow, SharePoint Designer, and third-party tools, which facilitate strong collaboration and process orchestration. “We aim for a modern, collaborative platform that empowers customers to apply their processes across a variety of sectors, such as HR, finance, and other organizational units,” explains Tina.

As a successful ITSM service provider, ITSM Company caters to multiple industry verticals. One such example is Carolina Biological Supply Company (CBS), a supplier of science and math education materials. The company was struggling with multiple challenges, such as reactive, manual, and cumbersome service requests and incident management procedures, lack of service management methodology, non-existent management reporting, and an inefficient workload balance. Consequently, CBS started its search for service desk software and identified ITSM360 as the strongest and most reliable solution. With the help of ITSM360, CBS could facilitate automated service requests; incident, problem, change, and project management processes; and procedures. Additionally, the client’s management gained more visibility into operational activities while end-users were able to raise and track requests.

Even as a fairly young company, ITSM Company has achieved significant milestones in the business. Besides Denmark, ITSM Company has a rich history of working with enterprises in Germany and Scandinavia and has been able to scale its business to clients in the U.S. and Canada— an achievement worthy of note. Another important accomplishment has been the changing face of the company’s target groups. Having started by covering basic ITSM needs and requirements, the firm has rapidly expanded its capabilities to include intermediate ITSM tools (as per the Gartner Groups classification). ITSM360 can also fulfill advanced requirements by using components within the Microsoft ecosystem, such as ITOM (via Intune integration), SCCM, and PowerShell (for runbook automation).

Regarding new technology, Microsoft Teams is the latest collaboration hub in the class. ITSM Company’s Engineering/R&D team is currently working on advanced ITSM360 releases using Microsoft Teams as a front-end. Tina mentions, “Teams and SharePoint are closely connected but, in an ITSM context, Teams offers a few new capabilities. We are excited about sharing this novel product line with our growing customer base.” With a partner network in Germany, the U.S., and Canada, the company’s expansion plans are also coming to fruition. This network will be expanded to include a new U.S. subsidiary just opened in New York, November 2019. ITSM Company looks forward to continuing to deliver excellence to its North American clientele over time.