Innovation is required for any business to succeed. However, navigating your growth without disrupting your current progress can be daunting. The complicated moving parts native to Information Technology (IT) infrastructure can make updating it especially delicate: tickets can get lost, responsibilities confused – even the process of approving the change itself can become muddled.
Fortunately, where there are technological complications, there are also solutions. IT change management software can help to make these adjustments easier with its powerful organizational capabilities. By closely monitoring IT variables such as outstanding tasks and company goals, it can contribute to saving you time and money.
In this article, we’ll cover the important role IT change management software plays in solving technical problems and smoothing operations. Then we’ll look at five key tasks it can support during a change.
The Role of IT Change Management Software
Most businesses will encounter the need to adjust their IT processes at some point in their life cycle. Whether it’s upgrading operating systems or incorporating new hardware, necessary status changes to your IT infrastructure typically carry some risk to the existing order.
IT change management software can help minimize this risk and cut down on disruptions for both your technology and your teams. It can keep your IT infrastructure running smoothly by:
- Simplifying communication
- Streamlining approvals
- Automating simple events during every phase of the change process
Even as technology evolves, support systems, such as change management software, remain critical to change success. This is due in large part to the stability they lend.
If you’re looking to implement new IT while also cutting down on the chaos associated with it, change management software might be the solution for you. To further illustrate the benefits, it helps to look at some of the specific issues it can alleviate.
5 Tasks IT Change Management Software Can Help With
When it comes to IT change management software, it’s smart to look for a product with functionalities that keep your teams productive and your customers happy. Below, we’ve summarized five major tasks IT change management software can help you with.
1. Clearly Delegating Responsibilities and Prioritizing IT Tickets
When your IT is changing, communication is key. Change management software can support this need by explicitly defining new roles for your teams and accurately reassigning their tasks.
This can be particularly useful if you’re restructuring and moving people around. When shifting responsibilities, change management software can help ensure that nothing gets forgotten in the shuffle. It can also help your teams avoid ‘change fatigue’ by giving them the tools needed to successfully fulfill their roles.
These features can also reduce confusion with your ticketing system. Change management software organizes and prioritizes outstanding tickets, letting your teams pick up where they left off after a change has been implemented.
Some change management products support this functionality even more by integrating directly into the ticketing platform. For example, SolarWinds Web Help Desk links these two essential features, an innovation that helps to streamline the process. It also lets you create and link tickets via email, offering a simple way to resolve outstanding issues regardless of the changes your system is undergoing.
2. Maintaining High Levels of Customer Satisfaction
Change doesn’t only affect your IT teams. As things reorganize within your business, there’s a chance that the effects of any internal confusion can end up frustrating your customers.
Change management software offers a way to mitigate this risk. It supports the efficient transition of tickets and reassignment of jobs. This means that employees can fully understand their roles and be able to provide top-notch customer service.
Ideally, no interruption on the back end means no interruption on the front end. By reducing this disruption for your organization’s internal customers – your employees – they will be better equipped to address your external customers’ needs and offer prompt, high levels of support.
3. Cutting Down on Tedious Tasks
When you’re juggling a lot of complex issues within your IT infrastructure, the last thing you probably want to deal with is busy work. Change management[1] software alleviates this need by letting you automatically route tedious tasks and information.
For example, if an employee has been promoted, there’s no need to manually make sure they get all the information they need. Instead, you can ensure the necessary documentation and resources are simply reassigned along with the role. These automations can be customized to your business, letting you get tasks where they need to go while optimizing the speed and ease of a change.
4. Working With Service Level Agreement (SLA) Management
Simply put, Service Level Agreement (SLA) management makes sure that you’re hitting your goals. This can include factors such as the time it takes to complete a ticket and the preventive measures taken to bolster security.
Change management software contributes to this process by keeping those objectives clear. When your goals are uncomplicated, your teams will have an easier time maintaining high levels of performance.
It’s especially helpful if your SLAs are changing alongside your IT alterations. If both your objectives and the way you accomplish them are evolving, the organizational features of change management software will be critical to keeping everything in line.
5. Streamlining Approval Processes
Any reworking of your system will probably require approval from key stakeholders across leadership and potentially impacted departments. Each business will have different requirements for this, and each change within a company is likely to have a unique process.
Change management software enables you to customize this process, giving you more control over individual approval chains:
It lets you easily make decisions in a variety of areas, including:
- How many people are required for approval
- How many levels of escalation the process must go through
- Whether timed reminders should be delivered
With customized approval processes, change management software can help you make sure that changes are fully communicated to your teams. The result is a smooth, seamless operation that results in less confusion and fewer delays.
Conclusion
Businesses aren’t stagnant. Change is necessary, inevitable, and unfortunately, often difficult. The growth of your company will likely come with several challenges that threaten to clog and disrupt your operations.
However, with the right IT change management software, you can embrace the evolution of your IT infrastructure with ease and grace. In this article, we covered five ways that IT change management can help you succeed:
- Clearly delegating responsibilities and prioritizing tickets
- Maintaining high levels of customer care and satisfaction
- Eliminating repetitive duties and tedious tasks
- Integrating seamlessly with SLA management to keep objectives clear
- Streamlining approval procedures to provide more control and customization