CHAPTER 4: SIAM ROADMAP STAGE 3: IMPLEMENT
The objective of this roadmap stage is to manage the transition from the organization’s ‘as-is’ current state to the ‘to-be’ desired future state, the new SIAM model. At the end of this stage, the new SIAM model will be in operation, although if a phased transition is chosen there may still be some service providers to onboard.
The timing for the start of the Implement stage can be influenced by events in the existing environment. For example, implementation could be triggered by:
•The end of an existing service provider’s contract
•An existing service provider ceasing to trade
•Changes in organizational structure because of corporate restructuring or takeover
•Planned SIAM transition project commencement
The customer organization may have limited control over the timing of some of these events. It may need to react to them by completing as many of the Discovery & Strategy, and Plan & Build activities as possible. There will be an increased level of risk if the activities from these stages are not fully completed because of a lack of time.
4.1 Comparing implementation approaches
The approaches to defining and managing the transition to a new SIAM model must be considered, along with any specific associated factors affecting the customer organization. Additionally, thought must be given to any identified risks that could affect the transition to the new SIAM ecosystem.
There are two possible approaches to implementation:
•‘Big bang’
•Phased
4.1.1 Big bang approach
A big bang implementation is one that introduces everything at once within a specified timeframe, including the service integrator, the service providers (with new or amended contracts), new services and new ways of working. This could be a planned approach or triggered by a change necessitating rapid transition to the SIAM environment.
Benefits of the big bang approach are:
•If it is successful, the organization has its new model in place quickly and can get used to the new norm. Speed, coupled with success, is likely to create a positive user experience.
•From a customer organization point of view, it also allows the achievement of a steady state more quickly, reducing risks and likely costs.
•It provides an opportunity to make a ‘clean break’ from all legacy issues and undesired behavior at the same time, avoiding the complexities of managing a phased approach.
There are some risks, however. Using a big bang approach means it becomes almost impossible to see if the transition has fully captured all the requirements until it is released. Using an Agile implementation approach can mitigate this and accommodate subsequent requirements that are identified for later implementation. In many instances, an external service integrator will work on a ‘fixed price’ contract, so it is unlikely that there will be any additional cost to the customer organization if changes are needed.
Exposing a whole organization to a new model can cause fear and disruption. The mechanisms defined in the Plan & Build stage become important here both in managing the transition of new service providers, systems and services, and in controlling the people elements of the change.
4.1.1.1 Key considerations for a big bang approach
Adopting a big bang approach may raise concerns from a delivery perspective. There could be an increased level of risk to the integrity of the new model and to the existing services that are being delivered. Existing service levels need to be maintained, referred to as ‘keeping the lights on’.
These considerations provide insight to help assess the suitability of this approach:
•Preparation time to define and agree the process framework before rollout – a key consideration of the Plan & Build stage.
•Tooling strategy and alignment between the service provider organizations.
•Time and resources available to test processes, interactions and tooling before the transition.
•Level of knowledge sharing (required and possible) and the handover of authority across the ecosystem.
•Transition period between incumbent service providers and the new service integrator.
•Transition time required by each service provider and the service integrator.
•Stability period for new ways of working to become established. Estimating an early life support (ELS) period that may need to extend or decrease. During this time, service performance targets may be reduced, or service credits put on hold.
•Alignment of contracts and deliverables.
•Alignment of governance framework.
•Business change within the customer organization environment.
•Sustaining the current service targets and commercial agreements.
•Cost.
4.1.1.2 Risks associated with a big bang approach
The risks associated with a big bang approach include:
•Potential higher risk/impact to existing services when compared to the phased approach
•Misalignment of contracts and no established collaboration clauses in place in time
•The service integrator is not able to lead as they are onboarding at the same time
•The service integrator does not have time to build authority with the service providers
•Inability to scenario test or stress test the SIAM model
•Inability to track individual performance against obligations, as all are onboarding at the same time
•Risk to the business/customer organization – the change is underestimated or not communicated, and is perceived to be badly managed
•Inability to benefit from lessons learnt for onboarding each service provider, as all service providers are onboarded at once
•Risk to inflight projects and subsequent challenges with transition of projects into service delivery
•Change management/inflight project impact – potential changes and releases could be impacted by the level of change within the environment:
oForward schedule of change from previous incumbent
oPatching schedules and planned maintenance affected adversely
4.1.1.3 Indicators for big bang
There are several indicators for the suitability of a big bang approach, such as:
•A greenfield opportunity without legacy contracts or incumbent service providers
•An alignment to another significant change, such as an organizational merger
•When intermediate transition states would cause significant complexity or an inability to maintain accountability during a phased transition
A very large, big bang implementation
A very large transition to a SIAM environment was implemented as a big bang. The implementation was for a company with global reach that implemented more than 50 global service contracts at midnight on the same day. In many cases, this was a change of service providers. Approximately 10,000 staff were affected.
The key to the transition was that it was a transfer of accountability – the new contract responsibilities were enacted and the new service providers became accountable for the transition of the actual services. In many cases, those service providers engaged the outgoing service providers for services to reduce risk, but this was the responsibility of the new service providers to manage.
A 24/7 ‘war room’ approach was used during the first two weeks to facilitate rapid response and collaboration of service providers – both onboarding and outgoing. This outcome-focused approach allowed the service providers to optimize locally without affecting the global approach. This was a successful transition with very little impact to the business and existing services.
4.1.2 Phased approach
A phased approach counters some of the risks associated with a big bang approach. For a phased approach, the Plan & Build stage defines a series of phases, with deliverables at the end of each phase.
A phased approach can more easily exploit Agile practices. A transition project can be worked on in sprints, with each sprint deploying extra functionality, new services and new service providers within different organizational functions. One of the most important aspects to consider with this approach is ensuring that each phased deliverable is adding value to the customer organization.
Minimum viable service
Another useful technique leveraged from Agile’s minimum viable product is the deployment of a minimum viable service. This is where a definition is made of the minimum amount of functionality and supporting processes that allow the customer to use the service.
This approach facilitates rapid deployment of what is important and allows support staff to focus on a much smaller area and accelerate fixes if issues are experienced. The minimum viable service can then be expanded in subsequent iterations.
Using a phased approach means that if an element fails, addressing it is not as time consuming or as complex, and it is unlikely to affect users as severely as in a big bang approach. Typically, managing in phases is easier, as real-time feedback can be given at regular intervals on necessary adjustments. This can be fed back into the Plan & Build stage, if required, so the necessary changes can be made as part of later iterations.
This approach still has challenges, especially if phases relate to strategic service providers tasked with delivering core business functions or services. In this instance, it is not always possible to limit the potential impact on core services. It is critical that an overall end date for the phased approach is specified as part of the Plan & Build outcomes, with clear and regular communication to and from users. This allows it to be clearly understood when the SIAM model is complete, and the Run & Improve stage begins.
4.1.2.1 Key considerations for a phased approach
Compared to a big bang approach, adopting a phased approach provides a decreased level of risk, but a similar level of complexity for all layers in the SIAM environment. Risks must still be considered before transitioning to a SIAM model using a phased approach. Phases could be organized by service providers, functions, processes, locations or a combination of these. With a phased approach, it can take longer for benefits to be delivered to the customer organization, so the benefits realization planning needs to be carried out carefully to take this into account.
Key considerations include:
•Establishing the service integration layer first before onboarding service providers
•Ability to embed the SIAM model and collaborative working methodology in phases
•Phasing the introduction of service providers, and their deliverables and obligations, into the SIAM ecosystem
•Implications of managing business demand and customer satisfaction during a phased approach, which will have less impact but over a longer period
4.1.2.2 Risks associated with a phased approach
The risks associated with a phased approach include:
•Services may be affected for longer and the impact on existing services might be unacceptable.
•Intermediate/transition states can create complexity and confusion.
•The customer organization experiences change fatigue, as the period of change lasts for a much longer time.
•Maintaining momentum over a longer period.
•Extended transitions can increase cost, particularly if the schedule is not managed effectively and delays cascade into subsequent phases.
•Impact on relationships with the incumbent service providers, especially if they are losing the contract but are not transitioning out until a later phase. This may drive subversive behavior, which has a higher probability of causing disruption.
•Risk to inflight projects is actually reduced, as there is more opportunity to plan the phases around them.
4.1.2.3 Indicators for a phased approach
The existence of one or more of these factors may indicate that a phased approach is the better option:
•The customer, service integrator or service providers (or any combination of these) do not possess the capability for a single, large change.
•An appetite for a lower risk and impact transition approach.
•Immaturity in multi-service provider models, indicating a cautionary approach that offers learning opportunities.
•A desire to retain control and flexibility around the timing of the phases.
•A requirement for phased cash flow. A phased approach may support cash flow and budgets. Time-specific events, such as onboarding and offboarding service providers, can be scheduled to better fit the financial situation or cycles of the customer organization.
•Legacy contracts might make phasing necessary.
4.1.3 Real-world conditions for implementation
Additional factors need to be considered when deciding on an implementation approach, for example:
•Does the implementation cover a single site or multiple sites? Are there multiple geographic regions involved?
oA big bang implementation on a single site is considerably easier to manage than across multiple sites.
oInterdependencies between locations could dictate that a phased approach is not viable.
•Does the implementation cover a single or multiple business units/functions?
oIf multiple, then it may be preferable to phase the implementation to reduce the risk for each unit.
•If different contracts expire at different times, then the cost of early termination should be weighed against the delayed benefits from a SIAM transition when waiting for the last contract to expire (which could be several years).
•If a phased approach is adopted, what will this mean for integration between the new and old environments during the interim period?
oThis is potentially one of the most problematic areas for phased transition projects. If the new way of working is implemented in a fragmented manner, then consideration must be given to how new and old will work together and for how long this is feasible. This can involve creating interfaces, interim arrangements and sometimes duplication, which would not be needed if all elements were introduced at once. It may also mean creating documentation, such as interim contracts, operating procedures and work instructions, which cover how the ecosystem will operate in the interim period.
•Are there any other competing business activities that need to be considered?
oFactors such as regulatory compliance, acquisitions, new product introductions and other capital expenditure programs can influence the required timescale for the move to a SIAM environment.
oBusiness events or cycles, for example, avoiding any change overlapping the September to mid-January period for retail organizations reliant on the Christmas season.
•What level of risk is acceptable?
oThe generally held view is that big bang implementations have an inherently higher level of risk, because the integrated nature will usually mean that a failure in one part can have subsequent effects elsewhere.
oA phased approach has risks for every phase and some, like delays, can accumulate and complicate across subsequent phases.
•Cost considerations.
oPhased implementations nearly always take longer to fully complete. This generally means more time from both incoming and outgoing service providers and the project team, and, therefore, increased costs. The additional time and cost should be balanced against some of the main arguments used to support or reject the approaches, such as the ability of the business to cope with a huge level of change happening all at once, as well as the increased risk of failure. Temporary interfaces, contract end dates, and legacy systems and services can also increase the cost of a phased approach.
4.1.4 Sustaining the current service
With any approach, it is important to ensure that there is limited disruption to the services being delivered. Even in the smoothest running transition there will be impacts to services.
When preparing for a transition, consider the following:
•Manage the expectations of the commissioning organization around:
oThe potential for reduced service-level achievements for a limited period during transition and early life support (ELS).
oThe need to undertake impact assessment of affected services, phased across the transition period, and how this affects business operations during transition.
•Work with HR and service providers to ensure required resources and capabilities are available.
•If the service desk is going to be delivered by a new service provider or the service integrator, it is often a good idea to transition this first, before other service providers. Establishing the new single point of contact provides a front door to the SIAM model and helps establish relationships.
•Agree and communicate a change freeze to minimize the risks. In some circumstances, allowances may be made, such as deployment of emergency changes or changes to services that are not related to the SIAM transition, based on risk assessment.
•Continue inflight projects but consider delaying or stopping new projects being initiated during transition to the SIAM model (see section 3.3.3.7 Accommodating inflight projects).
Within any transition, there will be varying degrees of change. In some instances, the impact may be limited. The transition team should take an adaptive approach to its work (see section 3.3.3 Transition planning).
4.2 How to transition to the approved SIAM model
The establishment of the service integrator and service providers is a key step in the SIAM transition. Consideration should be given to the impact of evolving relationships and team dynamics, which will be subject to change.
Ideally, all the core artefacts within the Plan & Build stage should be generated before service providers are onboarded (see section 3.1 Design the detailed SIAM model).
These include:
•Detailed SIAM model
•Selected SIAM structure
•Process models
•Governance model
•Detailed roles and responsibilities
•Performance management and reporting framework
•Collaboration model
•Improvement framework
•Tooling strategy
•Organizational change management (OCM) approach
•Onboarding process
•Transition plans
•Plans for technology and related integration capabilities – which may include manual, semi-automated or fully automated interfaces for toolsets
To onboard a service provider, there must be the capacity and capability for that service provider to execute its responsibilities. In a phased implementation, this might be an interim state while other service providers transition in a later phase. The SIAM artefacts mentioned above will form a crucial part of an effective transition. Without them, service providers will have to lead themselves and, although likely well intentioned, this can create unclear lines of responsibility, inconsistent approaches to delivery and service degradation.
It is good practice to start the transition by engaging the service integrator first, although this is not always feasible. The benefits of doing so will be that the service integrator can provide support in subsequent transition activities:
•Establishing processes and supporting infrastructure across service providers
oIt is a good idea here to undertake user-scenario testing (for example, test a change, run a major incident, run through a contract change)
•Commencing transition activities with new service providers and services, with the additional governance and management capability of the service integrator
oThis will support building relationships and establishing working environments from the beginning
•Support with the impacts of disengaging service providers that are not part of the new SIAM environment
•Toolset and process alignment between all parties
How to align service providers that work in different ways
Flexi Corporation’s ICT department consists of multiple service providers.
•Service provider A mainly provides infrastructure operational support to the production environment and uses ITIL processes for managing work.
•Service provider B is mainly responsible for the development of an application. Service provider B uses Scrum for the development of applications.
Despite the difference in how ITIL and Scrum work, the SIAM project team has created appropriate interfaces between them. Service provider A’s change management process (ITIL based) protects the production environment, by identifying risks and preventing negative impacts.
Although every change was captured under change control, to provide flexibility to development teams, the following model was agreed between service providers A and B:
•Change control over product backlog is delegated to the product owner, with service operation teams involved to ensure operational warranty requirements.
•Change control over the sprint backlog is delegated to the product owner.
•Release to development is approved by the product owner.
•Formal release and change to production is approved by a formal change management authority with input from stakeholders, including the product owner.
Some of the role mappings are shown here:
| Service provider A role | Service provider B role |
| Service owner | Product owner |
| CSI manager | Scrum master |
| Change authority | Scrum master and product owner |
4.2.1 Operational handover
The incoming service provider and the service integrator will wish to acquire knowledge from any incumbent service provider during transition, such as:
•Service definitions
•Configuration data
•Knowledge articles
•Open incidents and incident history
•Open problems
•Patterns of failure and their causes
•Current processes, procedures and interfaces
•Assets and their configuration
•External supplier agreements and service responsibilities
•Knowledge of the business and its demand/use patterns
•Service and systems designs as input to later change
•Ongoing CSI initiatives
However, this might prove to be difficult, as:
•Incumbent service providers can stall or create delays to avoid early disengagement.
•Knowledge sharing between subject matter experts (SMEs) of different service providers is often not defined until late in the transition lifecycle (and does not necessarily include the outgoing service provider).
•Incumbent service providers may be unwilling to release staff to attend knowledge transfer sessions, as this is resource effort/cost over and above the current day job or has potential to impact delivery of the current day job.
•Travel to either customer or service provider location may be an issue.
•As incumbent employees leave, the pool of skilled, knowledgeable staff reduces as the cutover date approaches.
Incumbent service providers are contracted to provide a level of service until the contract termination and may also be contracted to carry out handover activities (see section 3.1.3.11 Exit services schedule). Although some contracts may include a list of key personnel that can only be changed with the agreement of the customer organization, very few contracts have requirements for guaranteed levels of resource. It is quite likely that the number of knowledgeable resources in an incumbent service provider will reduce, as staff either leave to go to a different organization or to another part of the service provider.
Valuable resources
A service provider delivered services to a number of different government departments, under separate contracts. One of these was near termination and new service providers were being procured to be part of a SIAM model.
In order to avoid losing good staff through TUPE, the incumbent service provider moved them to work on other accounts. This loss of skilled resources affected achievement of service levels, but the service provider was happy to accept this, including the service credits, because retaining the staff was more important.
Key staff in any outgoing service provider will want to secure their own personal future, which may or may not be with the new service provider, or the outgoing one. However, if staff leave to take up a role in a different organization before or during the transition, they are no longer available to assist with the transition. Assumptions about critical relationships and availability of staff may not hold true. It may be necessary to incentivize the incumbent service providers to try and retain key staff until the transition is completed.
In practice, many SMEs from the outgoing service provider respond well to engagement at a professional and personal level, but can experience frustration about how much they are able and allowed to engage, over and above the day-to-day business as usual (BAU) activities.
To mitigate poor engagement, new service providers need to be clear about how their own processes are going to work within the SIAM model. Process documents and RACI matrices need to detail precise process activities and interaction points across the ecosystem and with all stakeholders.
These process documents are required for every process within the scope of the service integrator. This is no small undertaking and the effort and skill required to detail and agree these throughout the SIAM model, for even the simplest of structures, should not be underestimated.
At the point of handover, the service status should be baselined to include:
•Progress/achievement against acceptance criteria, including any mitigations suggested to address shortfalls.
•Volumes and status of inflight work items, not just projects, but incidents, problems, service requests, etc. This ensures an accurate view of the performance of the newly deployed service. For example, if there was a backlog of incidents outstanding before handover, this is not subsequently seen as an indication of the new service provider’s initial effectiveness.
•Service performance.
•Status of any outstanding/incomplete transition activities. In practice, there may be less significant activities that are uncompleted before handover, especially if the handover date is fixed. The decision may be to complete these under the new service provider rather than retain transition resources. For these activities, the new owner and action plan should be recorded for ongoing management.
4.2.2 Knowledge transfer
Knowledge transfer activities need to take place to ensure that every service is fully understood. Typically, this service information is documented in service definitions, architectural and process documents, contracts, configuration data and knowledge articles. It is likely that this knowledge is distributed throughout the outgoing service provider, as very few organizations maintain the ideal single repository.
The plan for knowledge transfer needs to identify knowledge areas, what is required, who owns it, who needs it and at what stage it is required. Careful planning and escalation of issues as they arise in the transition is required to ensure that knowledge is not lost from the outgoing service provider.
4.2.3 Early life support
It is a good idea to establish an early life support (ELS) function when transitioning to a SIAM model. This function assists with resolving incidents and issues, usually for a defined period aligned to the size and complexity of the transition. The function should include representatives from:
•The service integrator (responsible for managing ELS)
•Each of the service providers
•The customer organization’s retained capabilities
ELS staff should have knowledge of the services, the end-to-end architecture and the processes. They should use the defined and agreed processes, not create something different. In effect, they act as an integrated team covering incident management, problem management, release management and change management. Where possible, they should be co-located, at least shortly after transition, as this aids collaboration.
The decision to stand down ELS should be formal and recorded. The point when ELS disbands will be defined based on criteria, possibly including:
•Consistent achievement of service levels over a defined period
•Agreed level of customer satisfaction
•No high-priority incidents received in the past period
•No high-priority problems outstanding
These criteria should be measured throughout the ELS period. In these initial stages, the service integrator needs to apply close (operational) governance to ensure that all new service providers (including the service integrator itself) are complying with processes and agreements. This will require thorough auditing and reporting (focused on compliance), as well as communication and OCM to ‘get stakeholders on board’. Formal (for example, audits) and informal (for example, regular communication) approaches are both needed and should be balanced carefully.
If the implementation is phased, then ELS may be in place for some time as the phases complete. It may be paused and then reinstated as phases are rolled out, especially if there are gaps between phases. The participants may also change, so one ELS team may stand down on one day and another step up the next.
4.3 Apply ongoing organizational change management
Organizational change management OCM is introduced in section 3.2 in the Plan & Build stage. Within the Implement stage, OCM needs to manage the impact of the transition to the new SIAM environment. During this stage, there could be changes to processes, job roles, organizational structures and technology. It is the individuals from the service provider, the service integrator and the customer organization’s retained capabilities who must ultimately change how they undertake their roles. If these individuals are unsuccessful in their personal transitions and if they do not embrace and learn a new way of working, the transition to the SIAM model will fail.
OCM guides how to prepare, equip and support individuals to successfully adopt change. When implementing a SIAM model, OCM will address the people aspects of the transition by:
•Supporting the integration of new service providers and the decoupling of incumbent service providers that are not going to be part of the ecosystem
•Creating clarity and understanding of the new governance framework
oSupporting changes to working practice, including coaching individuals through changes to process or team dynamics
•Guiding communications, sponsorship and training:
oConducting awareness campaigns throughout the organization
oCommunicating with and preparing stakeholders for the change
oMeasuring the effectiveness of communications and organizational change activities
•Helping to support the diagnosis of struggling functions, service providers or process
4.3.1 Staff morale and motivation
The driving force for collaboration is motivation. For collaboration to succeed, each party involved needs to feel that they gain something or that they are providing a meaningful interaction towards a valuable result.
Transfer of services from one service provider to another affects the livelihood and careers of staff. Changes occur around them over which they may have little or no influence. This can be deeply unsettling and may cause staff to reappraise their career choices and future with an organization.
Maintaining morale
The management of staff within an outgoing service provider and the maintenance of morale towards the end of a contract, is particularly challenging for even the best of managers.
There can be a struggle to maintain concentration on business as usual (BAU) obligations and service levels, and at the same time there are demands on the existing service staff to participate in knowledge transfer and other requirements from the incoming service provider. Strong management support will be required.
Senior staff often concentrate on the commercial transition and give less priority to their workforce. This can deliver surprises when staff suddenly resign. The loss of key staff can materially affect the knowledge retained within the service environment and increase the risks to service continuity and a successful transition.
Loss of key staff may, however, also act as a positive enabler during a transition. The rest of the team pull together and create a stronger team, with different team members having the chance to step up and lead.
4.3.1.1 Positive stakeholder engagement
How someone goes about the work they do, the people they work with and the position and direction of the business they work for, affects how engaged they are. Fully engaged individuals will positively promote the work they do and the interests and reputation of the business they work for.
Improved engagement starts with understanding the objectives and commitments of the business, identified through vision, mission and values statements. All individuals in the SIAM model need to know what the business of the customer organization is, how it operates, its strategic direction and their contribution and role in this endeavor. For service providers and any external service integrator, this understanding is in addition to their knowledge of the goals of the organization they are employed by. The vision for SIAM is created in the Discovery & Strategy stage, led by the customer organization and the service integrator.
Building and maintaining positive stakeholder engagement comes through:
•Regular, positive communication and regular meetings, which reinforce the value of the work people do (for example, ‘town hall’ meetings or one-to-one sessions)
•Asking for feedback and listening to what all team members have to say
•Providing people with the tools and resources they need to do their job effectively
•Supporting people with professional development and training (such as ongoing professional development plans, communities of practice or mentors)
•Caring for staff welfare and well-being
•Recognizing and rewarding extra effort and outstanding results
•Encouraging fun and humor in the workplace
Within a SIAM ecosystem, these activities need to happen across the SIAM layers, within each layer and across the functions and structural elements.
Transitioning to a SIAM environment presents a unique set of circumstances, some of which include:
•Aligning multiple organizations and their management cultures
•Dealing with ‘subcultures’ within individual organizations
•Working within legislation when transferring employment
•Working with multiple preferred methods of communication across multiple organizations
4.3.1.2 Displaced staff
Moving to a SIAM model often involves considerable changes to staffing, especially if the move involves using additional external service providers and a service integrator and/or offboarding existing internal or external service providers. There are issues associated with staff displacement that should be considered, including:
•Motivation and morale: in situations where the transfer will take some time, there are likely to be issues in motivating staff to operate at the required level as the transfer commences, when they are about to become redundant.
•Knowledge transfer: incumbent staff may be unwilling to share information or support staff within the new SIAM model.
•Staff quality: some people would rather stay with their old employer or wait to be dismissed and trigger a redundancy package. This can result in issues where less motivated staff remain and motivated staff leave.
The customer organization must ensure that any relevant legislative implications are factored into the transition plan and any commercial and contractual agreements.
Working with HR
Open communication and working with HR and any staff side (trade union) representatives is incredibly important. Breaching employment law or breaking existing working practice agreements can add time and expense to any initiative and create reputational damage. Ignoring such basics also runs the risk of undermining trust in the initiative. Ensure that plans for change have the full backing of all stakeholder groups.
Impact of staff displacement
The way an employer deals with staff displacement has powerful implications for those retained. A botched program can leave a workforce feeling shaken and demoralized. This is not good news for fostering the necessary inter-team, inter-provider requirements to work as a cohesive and collaborative unit.
Keeping staff on side and feeling positive about the organization has important implications for future performance. The best approach is to ensure that all parties are well informed. The timing of the announcement is crucial. Waiting until Friday afternoon and asking staff to clear their desk is likely to be not only unlawful but also hugely inconsiderate.
Move to an outsourced SIAM model
A British multinational insurance company is headquartered in London. It has approximately 33 million customers across 16 countries.
The organization took over an automobile breakdown cover company, based in the UK, offering global roadside assistance. This company’s IT had been wholly insourced. Given the global nature of the mother organization and its complex web of providers, it decided that, to support this new business, it would move to a SIAM model using the services of a renowned service integrator. This external organization was to take over responsibilities for the service desk and the service integration role, and was based in India.
A staff consultation period commenced, with HR, legal and union representatives. These stakeholders were engaged many months before the planned transition. No staff chose to take roles in India and it was agreed that staff would be displaced over an 18-month period, to allow for a smooth handover.
Several of the incumbent staff went to India to support new staff with the transition during a period of early life support. The transition went well, largely because of the investment in good staff, robust training and the gradual testing and transition elements.
The incumbent, displaced staff were generously rewarded for their service during that critical period. It is difficult to motivate staff who are losing their jobs. In this instance, the additional experience they gained as well as the opportunity to work overseas was coupled with a financial reward.
Although incumbent staff were unhappy to be losing their jobs, they also acknowledged the company’s care in handling the situation. They spoke favorably about their experiences with their previous employer, helping it to maintain a good market reputation within the UK.
Do not assume that an employee will always be difficult after being made redundant. Personal pride means this is often not the case and some employees welcome a new opportunity or a financial settlement. Although some additional measures may need to be considered to protect data, knowledge, intellectual property (IP), etc., in most cases such methods are not required.
Staff who remain at an organization after their colleagues have been laid off may experience feelings likened to bereavement, and it can leave them demoralized, anxious and desperate to find a new job. Many good staff are lost in this way, which can affect ongoing operations.
Fear, uncertainty and distrust
Following the move to a SIAM model, a London-based homelessness charity’s issues were evident, in particular with regard to retained staff.
The charity had onboarded a new external service integrator into the organization, a move that some staff felt had not been handled as well as it could have been. The organization had made some redundancies to accommodate the new service integrator, as well as changing some of the incumbent staff roles within the retained capabilities. This included altering some of their terms and conditions.
To resolve the issues, a workshop was held with the charity's staff and the service integrator, with the aim of helping them to get to know each other’s roles better, as well as enabling them to feel that they could challenge each other in a constructive way. Staff were also encouraged to generate new ideas for improving the charity's services to clients and were empowered to present these suggestions to management in a way that explained the pros and cons.
Workshop attendees reported that, following the event, the team was ‘more open’, had a ‘greater clarity of purpose’, and that the opportunity to air their views had left staff feeling more confident and better motivated.
One of the outputs of the workshops was a change in the strategy for motivating internal staff and service providers by creating an award, for which potential recipients were nominated by the charity's users.
4.3.2 Communicating with and preparing stakeholders
Transition to a SIAM environment is likely to be led by the customer organization and its project management office (PMO), with assistance from the service integrator once it is appointed and operational. It will benefit from a dedicated communications team to ensure continuity (see section 2.2.3.2 Project roles). Each service provider should also have its own communications team, responsible for communication within its own organization.
Who is involved and how they are involved is a critical success factor (CSF). As initial messages are drafted and target audiences are defined, it is important to be aware of the needs of different stakeholders. Some staff will be critical in driving the initiative forward, some will need to understand a change in how services are delivered to them and some will need to be prepared for new ways of working. Use analytical techniques such as stakeholder maps to identify the level of interest and influence of each stakeholder (see section 2.6.5 Stakeholders).
From that analysis, four special types of stakeholders are key to organizational change management (OCM):
•Executive sponsor
•Project manager
•Core communications team
•Communications advisory team
Executive sponsorship is a key component of successful adoption of the SIAM model. This needs to be someone with enough influence and interest to deliver messages with credibility and authority. Many SIAM transitions fail because they do not secure executive support for communication early enough.
The project manager is the enabler and communicator who can connect with all the stakeholder groups. They have an important role in ensuring the cadence and sequencing of communication and messaging. For example, it can be very important in some cultures that senior managers are aware of a message or announcement before the rest of the organization.
The core communications team is the group that does most of the work preparing communication for the initiative. This should be a small group, comprising people who provide specialist communication. This team will need to have marketing skills and experience in OCM methods such as awareness, desire, knowledge, ability and reinforcement (ADKAR) (see section 3.2 Organizational change management approach).
The communications advisory team is an inclusive group that supports the core communications team. It may be an existing management team, board or forum (with a representative of each of the stakeholders – service integrator, customer retained capabilities and service providers), or a smaller team of self-selected individuals from key groups (for example, HR, trade unions, staff associations). This team is engaged for input and may help test communication ideas for the project team.
Internal service provider teams need special care
Internal service provider teams often need additional care as a stakeholder group. They may expect to be treated differently to external teams. A SIAM transition will challenge this perception because they will have the same accountabilities as an external service provider. History shows this can be a difficult organizational change and care should be taken to manage this class of stakeholder.
4.3.3 Conducting awareness campaigns
During the Implement stage, awareness campaigns can help communicate important messages about the new environment to appropriate stakeholders. SIAM transition awareness campaigns typically have five main components:
1.Establish the objectives of the campaign
2.Establish a target audience
3.Define awareness campaign strategies
4.Be certain of the message
5.Measure the success of the campaign
Establish the objectives of the campaign
Establishing the objectives for the awareness campaign requires an understanding of what needs to be achieved. What are the messages to be delivered and mediums to be used? What attitudes or opinions need to be achieved? These objectives should be specific, measurable, agreed, relevant and time-bound (SMART) so that efforts can be evaluated later. It is not enough to go out and simply raise awareness.
Awareness campaign
A UK logistics organization set up an initial three-month awareness campaign with the sole intent of defining and beginning to adopt a ‘single customer culture’ as it moved from a single outsourcing partner to a multi-service provider SIAM model.
Establish a target audience
Having a specific target audience ensures the message is directed at relevant groups of people. In certain instances, this will be self-selecting. For example, a campaign encouraging service providers to adopt a process will undoubtedly be aimed at those using the specific process (see section 4.3.2 Communicating with and preparing stakeholders).
Assessing the target audience identifies different groups to contact. For example, raising awareness of new service desk processes in a SIAM environment will require subdividing of the target audience. There may be a different focus for people working for the service integrator, those in the customer organization’s retained capabilities, service provider staff or indeed the users of the service desk.
Define awareness campaign strategies
The ability to formulate appropriate campaign strategies depends on knowledge of the target audience. For example, the ideal locations for town hall meetings are in areas easy to reach and local to the employees involved.
Champions
Consider identifying ‘champions’ within the customer organization to promote SIAM, assist with the awareness campaign, and help with training and knowledge transfer.
Be certain of the message
Knowing all the facts about the message to be delivered is a precursor to a successful campaign. It is important that the team delivering the awareness campaign is prepared and has the relevant knowledge to back up the message at all levels. For example, local team leads must understand the messages being sent from the center and be briefed in how to deal with feedback and questions.
Concentrate communication on addressing:
•What is going to change or happen and when?
•What is ‘in it’ for the stakeholder group concerned?
•What are the implications for the stakeholder?
•How does this support the desired outcomes of the SIAM transition?
•Are there short-term risks and workarounds that may affect the stakeholder or where cooperation is required?
Prepare the briefing
An organization that moved to a SIAM model made effective use of carefully planned briefing sessions. Direct managers communicated to staff so that they had an opportunity to ask questions without fear of reprisal or concern about speaking in a larger corporate forum.
All ‘briefing managers’ undertook training regarding message delivery. They were also provided with pre-scripted answers they could refer to regarding anticipated questions.
A senior manager was made available after each session so staff could ask additional questions, or the briefing manager could do so on their behalf and communicate back to them.
All questions asked were collated to extend the list of FAQs, which was made publicly available on the corporate intranet.
Measure the success of the campaign
The last step is evaluation, to understand whether the communication has reached the audience (and reached them effectively). If communication efforts are a success, it is important to recognize what the audience will learn, what they will understand and believe, and how they will act.
Identify what is important to measure. There are several metrics that might be considered to assess the impact of a campaign:
•Activity metrics: these metrics can provide a better understanding of behavioral change. For example, activity metrics can help to evaluate process adoption.
oConsider whether there is a discernible change in attitude or behavior among the target audience members.
•Engagement metrics: these metrics can help to demonstrate the effect the communications messages are having on those who hear them. Engagement metrics are a measurement of when and how others engage.
oConsider conducting a survey to understand if the message and mediums suited the audience.
•Impact metrics: these metrics are all about what is really trying to be achieved. Impact metrics help to measure the behaviors and attitudes that have been shifted and the wrongs righted.
oConsider reviewing process outcomes for success. For example, look for a positive change in attendance of the structural elements.
It is important to have a monitoring system to track results. A myriad of online tools exist for tracking traffic and engagement levels, but it takes a human being to monitor both offline and online conversations and messaging to see if the new way of working is becoming the norm.
Facilitate preparation
A service integrator was going through a major change affecting how it was structured. As most of the staff were based in one location, the communications team held a weekly face-to-face communication and feedback session.
Attendance soon declined after the first session, down to an average of 30 percent. The feedback was that staff had other meetings back-to-back with this session in other buildings and some worked from home.
The format of the session was changed to online, and attendance rose to 90 percent and remained at that level throughout the project.
Finally, consider how to ‘close the loop’ as part of communication. How are feedback and comments collected and addressed? If staff do not see responses to their feedback, they will be less likely to engage in future campaigns.
Regardless of the measurements used, it is important to benchmark the results gathered against the milestones identified for the transition plan and trend the results over time. In general, communication activities do not produce results immediately. This is especially true where the transition has taken a phased approach, as the overall benefit of the SIAM transition may not be measurable until all phases have been completed.
4.3.4 Measure effectiveness
Measuring the people side of change is a necessary success indicator of the transition to a SIAM environment. However, the evaluation of organizational change management (OCM) is an extremely complex, difficult and highly political process in many SIAM transitions, especially where numerous subcultures exist.
Three major areas should be considered when seeking to understand the balanced effect of communication and OCM activity:
•Individual employee metrics
•Project performance metrics
•OCM activity metrics
These should be defined for every organization in the SIAM ecosystem, to understand their areas of weakness. They should be analyzed by service provider and by process area/function, and actions taken to address any issues. Experience shows that issues are more likely to be expected with groups that do not take OCM seriously.
The individual employee metrics below are commonly used when demonstrating OCM effectiveness. Many of these measures identify where employees are in the change process and how they are progressing:
•Process adoption metrics
•Usage and utilization reports
•Compliance and adherence reports
•Employee engagement, buy-in and participation measures
•Employee feedback
•Issue, compliance and error logs
•Service desk calls and requests for support
•Awareness and understanding of the change
•Observations of behavioral change
•Employee readiness assessment results
Project performance metrics can also help to measure ongoing OCM where it is possible to isolate the effects of specific actions. The metrics below expose how important it is to have delivered a thorough planning phase at the beginning of the SIAM initiative to identify these measures:
•Performance improvements
•Progress and adherence to plan
•Business and change readiness
•Project KPI measurements
•Benefits realization and return on investment (ROI)
•Adherence to timelines
•Speed of execution
Finally, it is possible to track the OCM activities in isolation. Regardless of the type of change, all structured OCM initiatives involve these activities, making these metrics useful for any project:
•Tracking of OCM activities conducted according to transition plan
•Training participation and attendance numbers
•Training tests and effectiveness measures
•Communication delivery
•Communication effectiveness
4.3.5 SIAM social network
A SIAM environment should redefine traditional collaboration by including a social angle. This solution should not just be confined to the traditional and formal interactions (for example, email or online meetings), but also extend to social networking functionality such as micro-blogging, wikis, profiles, tagging and feeds. A strong social network capacity within the SIAM environment can help to foster openness.
SIAM social network tools include:
•Collaboration: allows the customer organization, service integrator and service providers to share and distribute information with others, including documents, email, instant messages, online meetings, video conferencing, webinars, screen sharing, etc.
•Content: standard format for documents, video and images that can be used throughout the SIAM social network.
•Communication: smart utilization of search engines, bookmarking, news feeds, profiles, commenting, photo sharing, favorites and ratings.
Social media guidance
Guidance should be given to staff on the appropriate use of social channels, of social norms, acceptable language and content – together with a robust information security policy and outline of the obligations of all stakeholders.
In a case of dispute, any recorded communications may be produced in court. This may prove embarrassing at best and end in legal action or contract termination at worst.
Different service providers will often be remotely located, sometimes in different countries. In these situations, the value of social tools in promoting and fostering informal networks and channels can be significant. Where staff are co-located, regardless of the service provider organization, the value of social network tools is likely to be smaller. However, full co-location is rare within a SIAM environment.
4.4 Applicable SIAM practices
Practice definition
“The actual application or use of an idea, belief or method, as opposed to theories relating to it.”32
Within the SIAM Foundation BoK, four types of practice are described:
1.People practices
2.Process practices
3.Measurement practices
4.Technology practices
These practice areas address governance, management, integration, assurance and coordination across the layers, and need to be considered when designing, transitioning or operating a SIAM model. This section looks at each of these practice areas and provides specific, practical considerations within the Implement stage. Note that the people and process practices will be combined and referred to as ‘capability’.
4.4.1 Capability (people/process) considerations
The implementation of and transition to a SIAM environment is a major change for most organizations. Elsewhere, the necessity of organizational change management (OCM) has been discussed (see section 4.3 Apply ongoing organizational change management). OCM capabilities need to be present in almost all layers and participants of the Implement stage.
Specifically, the following capabilities need to be employed:
•The customer organization’s retained capabilities need to remain accountable for maintaining the governance and direction of the overall implementation. New contracts come into place, while old ones are terminated or in some cases modified. This will require commercial and legal capabilities to act on escalations from the service integrator if contractual obligations are not being met.
•The service integrator is accountable for managing its own activities, plus all activities of the service providers in the Implement stage. Not only will it have to put its own operations in place, but it also needs to manage, assure and, where appropriate, integrate those of the service providers that are moving into the SIAM model. Another practice that is specifically applicable during the Implement stage is the management of cross-functional teams, which might also be virtual (see section 3.2.3 Virtual and cross-functional teams).
•The service providers’ role in the Implement stage includes aligning their processes and people to the SIAM structural elements, becoming familiar with the terms within collaboration agreements, considering process interfaces, understanding individual contract requirements and targets, as well as end-to-end service requirements.
Particularly during the initial ‘settling in’ period, the attitude of ‘fix first, argue later’ needs to be adopted to overcome any initial issues and successfully establish the SIAM environment.
Fix first, DISCUSS later
The concept of ‘fix first, argue later’ is not unique to a SIAM environment, but was defined from a SIAM perspective within the SIAM Foundation BoK.
Although often literally applied in the real world, the concept is not suggesting that there should be an argument. Rather, it suggests that the initial focus needs to be on fixing the issue at hand. Discussions on who was responsible for the issue (‘argue’ in the phrase) will take place after resolution (or at least once there is a reduced urgency).
Furthermore, this is not intended to be an argument or finger-pointing exercise, more of a ‘lessons learned’. Ideally, perhaps the phrase is better served by replacing the word ‘argue’ with ‘discuss’, ‘settle’, ‘negotiate’, ‘debate’, ‘analyze’ or ‘resolve’, which have more positive connotations and involve the next steps, for example, a post-incident review.
Some other people and process practices to consider in this stage include:
•Process (and tool) integration testing
•Establishment of the structural elements (boards, process forums and working groups)
•Training (of people, in the process, measurement and technology practices)
4.4.1.1 Process integration testing
A good way to test processes is to use a technique known as ‘conference room pilots’ or ‘walkthrough tests’. In these, end-to-end tests are designed to walk through a process (and any related processes) and its interfaces between providers and the service integrator.
For example, a test could be:
•Service desk receives an incident from a user
•Service desk triages the incident and passes it to service provider A for further investigation
•As this is happening, more calls are received and the priority is escalated
•Service provider A requests assistance from network service provider B
•The root cause is identified and an emergency change is raised
•The change is approved and the fix is implemented
These tests should be carried out using operational tools and processes, but away from the production environment. The aim is to test that the documentation is correct, that everyone knows what to do and that there are no gaps or overlaps.
Conference room pilot
During a test of resolving incidents through a chain of three service providers, when it came to escalation from one service provider to another, the service desk agent said ‘So, I know I should call service provider B, but what is its telephone number?’.
The test was marked as ‘failed’ and was rerun once the service desk confirmed that the service provider’s telephone numbers were now recorded in the service management tool and supporting artefacts.
These tests can also be used as acceptance testing for the customer organization, as they demonstrate that all parties know their responsibilities, have the required capabilities and can work together effectively.
4.4.1.2 Establishing the structural elements
The structural elements are defined in the governance model. Although some of the governance boards should already be in place (see section 2.3.7 SIAM governance roles), the remaining structural elements are formally established during the Implement stage, including the process forums. These forums should have met at least once before the first transition activities and should have reviewed their terms of reference and had them signed off.
Within the Plan & Build stage, each structural element will have defined its attendees and who can now be assigned, along with its purpose, meeting type (for instance, face to face, online, telephone conference) and meeting frequency. Regular face-to-face meetings can be impractical in many SIAM ecosystems because of geographical spread. In this case, it is good practice to have an initial face-to-face meeting and then once a year, with the intermediate meetings using online/telephone conferences.
4.4.1.3 Training
Delivering an effective training program is an important element of a transition to a SIAM model. Training all the staff required in the time available can be a challenge. Train too early and they could forget most of what they need to know. Train too late and they may not be able to absorb all of the information.
Bringing together a variety of cultures and learning styles in a SIAM ecosystem will expose any weaknesses, and this usually requires traditional training methods to be enhanced. Organizations must aim to create training programs that are fit for purpose, based on the needs of those requiring training. They must allow all stakeholders to maximize their learning potential while gearing their experience towards their particular interests.
There are five important characteristics of effective training programs that must be kept in mind to ensure best results on an individual and organizational level. These characteristics prepare participants for the types of behaviors needed in a successful SIAM model, and will increase the effectiveness of the training program:
1.Personalize: allow for the organization of information into modules and packages for different types of people and their individual requirements.
2.Challenge based: allow for participants to share and comment on challenges within the training scenarios, working together to solve issues and share advice. Discovering answers in such an environment is proven to embed learning much more quickly than traditional methods.
3.Collaborative: allow participants to work across teams and enhance their learning experience. Teamwork is crucial to any SIAM ecosystem and training programs should foster this type of work ethic.
4.Multi-topic: ensure that training programs incorporate various areas of knowledge, not just a single area of expertise.
5.Networked: ensure that as many people as possible can use the resources you provide, anytime and anywhere.
Training that ignores culture is unlikely to be effective. It is important to ensure that there is sufficient time made available to individuals to complete their training, perhaps by offering to cover their role temporarily. In other organizations, training is accommodated in the background without fuss.
4.4.2 Measurement practices
During the Implement stage, the SIAM model is put in place. Towards the end of the stage, there is a ‘transition readiness’ phase where the Run situation is approximated during final testing, without it being business as usual (BAU) just yet. This involves:
•Enabling end-to-end service measurement
•Running end-to-end service measurement
In these early stages of running the environment and measuring performance, the initial focus should be on compliance, rather than efficiency or even effectiveness. It is also a time where there may be some adjustment of the measurements and the reporting framework.
Other measurements to consider are ‘progress metrics’ of the Implement stage and initial metrics to measure the benefits of the SIAM transition, baselined against the benefits planned at the Strategy stage. These might include percentage measures of:
•SIAM roles/structural elements filled
•Service providers onboarded
•Service providers’ internal training completed
•Services mapped across service providers (service grouping model completed)
•Processes implemented (and the maturity of these processes, and/or percentage of interfaces completed)
•Services operating to expected levels (at least as high as pre-transition)
•Contractual obligations met
•Measurements against acceptance criteria
4.4.3 Technology practices
The tooling strategy outlines the requirements for a toolset or toolsets to support the SIAM ecosystem. It will include functional and non-functional requirements, the processes that need to be supported, standards for interfacing to the toolset(s) and a roadmap for future development.
In the Plan & Build stage, the integration requirements helped to create the tooling strategy (see section 3.1.9 Tooling strategy), which in this stage needs to be implemented, including the following steps:
•The service integrator implements or integrates the toolsets as per the strategy
•The service integrator refines the policies and standards for data exchange in conjunction with the service providers
•Service providers either integrate their tool, implement the common one if a single tool is to be used or implement ‘swivel chair’ procedures
•Each service provider tests its own tools, to ensure that it can provide the required outputs
•The service integrator tests its tools
•The service integrator runs end-to-end tests of the tools, ensuring that all interfaces operate as designed
Note that temporary tools for the migration of the outgoing service provider’s data may be required, potentially including a manual or ‘swivel chair’ approach, as well as temporary reporting accessing different data sources.
The Implement stage is the first time the success or the limitations of the tooling strategy will be experienced, such as:
•Ineffective legacy tools
•Non-compliant service provider
•Lack of architecture
•Unidentified faults
Together with the measurements (and process) practices of the previous sections, the completion and success of the technology implementation needs to be scrutinized.
32 www.lexico.com/definition/practice.