BMC DIGITAL ENTERPRISE MANAGEMENT: Digital Business Done Fast

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In order to help businesses make digital transformation fast, seamless, and optimized, BMC has designed a set of IT solutions called BMC Digital Enterprise Management.

Developed by BMC, Digital Enterprise Management (DEM) is an approach to the management of digital services, infrastructure, processes, and policy. DEM includes a set of groundbreaking best practices and best-in-class software solutions. The purpose of DEM is to help you build a high-performance platform to support innovation in the digital enterprise. BMC’s approach balances the need to drive innovation with the practical realities of building a more robust and efficient infrastructure.

Digital Enterprise Management focuses on fourkey disciplines,each designed toaddress a set ofspecific demandsplaced on the business. In addition, DEM comprisesa shared solution fountation that spans Analytics, Orchestration, CMDB, and SLM (see illustration). Thefour disciplines are:

Digital Service ManagementDeveloped by BMC, Digital Service Management is the next step in the evolution of IT Service Man-agement. This update in concept is intended to help your business rethink traditional models of request and support to deliver a set of human-centric solu-tions and best practices that redefine their relation-ship between the providers and the consumers of their digital services.

Digital Enterprise AutomationDigital Enterprise Automation enables your business to deliver new levels of industrial efficiency and pre-cision, providing a more strategic and integrated

approach to automation. A comprehensive and policy-driven platform helps you orchestrate and automate the full digital infrastructure stack.

Digital Service AssuranceDigital Service Assurance takes traditional assur-ance principles beyond mere monitoring, integrat-ing data from multiple external sources to allowyour business to take action quickly based on customer on- line posts and complaints. BMC has built a set of in- tuitive, intelli- gent data-driv- en solutions that ensure digital services operate at the highest levels of performance and optimum capacity.

Digital Infrastructure OptimizationDigital Infrastructure Optimization is BMC’s ap-proach to building and maintaining a leaner, more cost-effective digital infrastructure. It can help you avoid wasted capacity and licensing across the entire technology portfolio.

Analytics, Orchestration and PolicyBMC provides a common foundation for configura-tion data, automation, orchestration, analytics, and policy, enabling your business to share a single, real-time view of your infrastructure across teams and processes.

To learn more about BMC Digital Enterprise Management, go to www.bmc.com/DEM

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BMC Remedy 9: A Giant Step Forward in ITSM

“With Remedy 9 we set out to delight our users and

customers with a big focus on the user experience

for every user in the service organization.”

Michele McFadden, BMC Sr. Director ITSM Product Management

For more than 20 years Remedy has maintained a leadership position within the ITSM product catego-ry. In recent years, while many continued to appreci-ate its consistent performance and reliability based on many years of development, critics claimed that Remedy had become a legacy product and newer, flashier ITSM solutions were beginning to overtake its standing. Move aside, critics, and make way for Remedy 9! With the newly released Remedy 9, BMC has taken a giant step forward in ITSM.

Built on a 100% Oracle® Java® codebase to deliver high performance in the most complicated IT environments, Remedy 9 is a true multi-tenant platform delivered from the cloud or your own datacenter, and scales for the largest enterprises. The mobile-first platform takes advantage of native device capabilities such as Apple® Siri®, GPS, and built-in cameras, providing new and better ways to work. In a blog article on Remedy 9, Michele Mc-Fadden of BMC said, “Our first independent study of the improved productivity of our new user experi-ence showed a 75% improvement in productivity in resolving common service desk incidents compared industry standards. As we bring that same focus and new levels of productivity to areas like change and knowledge management, and to process owners and service delivery managers with our new Smart Reporting, we hope to meet or better that stat for every professional in the service organization.”

Some of the new and improved features include:

Powerful Analytics: New Smart-Reporting allows for simple, self-service, drag and drop creation of dash-boards and reports.

Service Desk in Your Pocket: Remedy 9 mobilizes your workforce on both sides of the service desk, taking advantage of native mobile device capabili-ties such as touch screens, predictive text, barcode scanners, cameras, GPS, and push notifications.

Consumerized Knowledge: Powerful and modern knowledge authoring tools empower the whole organization to create knowledge articles. Context aware searches automatically find similar articles and embedded Knowledge Centered Support (KCS) best practices allow users to flag, comment, and rate articles of interest.

Change Request Wizards: On-screen wizards guide you through the change process quickly and easily while ensuring accuracy and consistency.

Intuitive Self-Service: Log an incident, request a service, reserve a room, download an app, or check service availability all from the convenience of a mobile app.

Persona-Based UX: The engaging user experi-ence is personalized to your role ensuring that you see the information you need to do your job more effectively. The context-aware capabilities in Remedy 9 ensure you are automatically presented with relevant incidents, problems, articles, assets, and services to save you time running searches and reports.

To try Remedy 9 online online, go to: http://www.rightstar.com/try-bmc-remedy-9-online-now/

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ITIL BASICS:

Release & Deployment ManagementBest Practices

Deploying releases successfully into operation and establishing the effective use of the service specified by the Service Design phase is the primary goal ofRelease & Deployment Management.

A component of the ITIL Service Transition Phase, Release and Deployment Management process-es are implemented at various stages as outlined below:

1. Release PolicyOrganizations must first define the end goals, scope, and principles related to adopting the release management processes across the enter-prise. The time to do this is before any development activity takes place.

2. Release PlanningFollowing release policy guidelines, release plans are designed and approved by senior management. The plans should include governance aspects as well as detailed process designs for implementing releases across the enterprise.

3. Hardware and Software DesignAt this stage the actual assets required for a release are designed and configured. This includes the hardware and software required for the build, test and delivery of code.

4. Built and Configure ReleaseDuring this phase the code from development is built and tested internally to ensure build integrity.

5. Quality ReviewThe QA team assesses the quality of the release, checking that the release meets minimum accept-able standards and business requirements.

6. Release AcceptedOnce the QA team has successfully tested a re-lease, the functional team validates the results and the release is approved for deployment. If there are bugs identified during the QA assessment stage, the release is sent back to the development team for a bug fix.

7. Rollout PlanAfter the release is approved for deployment, the release is ready for the Production environment where end-users can access the new capabilities.

8. Communicate and TrainThe communication and training stage is a critical part of a service delivery or transition. Here, end-users are provided information about the product or service and are trained to use the new release.

9. Implement ReleaseThe release is deployed for live or real-time usage.

10. Verify ImplementationIt is good practice to verify a release each time it is deployed in Production. This is to ensure that the release behaves as expected in the live environ-ment.

The mechanisms used to release and deploy the service components should be established in the release design phase. Automation will help to en-sure repeatability and consistency. Manual activities can slow down the release team and create re-source or capacity issues that affect service levels.

To explore BMC’s automated software tools for handling ITIL-based Release & Deployment Management processes, call RightStar at (703) 242-7200 or contact us via our website: http://www.rightstar.com/contact-us/

on the risk of new ITSM processess or systems. It is the old adage, “no one ever got fired for select-ing IBM,” or “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.”

Of course, most ITSM systems and processess are broken and it is up to us to fix things. ITIL, by itself is not the answer, and a toolset such as Remedy-force is not necessaily the answer either. Recent-ly a cutomer moved from SDE to Remedyforce. Shortly after implementing Remedyforce, we received an email saying, “we tried Remedyforce and don’t like it. What else you got?” Fortunately, we had FootPrints to offer . . .

How does RightStar overcome these challenges? Here are several suggestions:

First, we are not wrench turners, we are consul-tants. When the customer says, “This is stupid,” it is up to us to respond, “Trust me, this will be better in the end.”

Go for quick wins. Don’t try to implement all ITIL 26 processess at once. Look for one or two pro-cessess and put all effort there.

Education and simulation training. Since the biggest challenge is the people, why not focus on training. The Apollo 13 simulation exercise is an excellent way to kick-off any project as it help people change the way they looked at ITSM. Who thought ITIL could be fun?

Measurement and validation. Work on improve-ments in reporting, or for those more serious, look at ITSM benchmarking from MetricNet.

Visit Dick Stark’s blog at http://dick1stark.com

Overcoming ITSM Adoption Challenges

by Dick Stark, President & CEO, RightStar Systems

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We are currently work- ing with a RightStar customer to help re-en-gineer their FootPrints system to make it better. And recently, I interviewed a Remedy consul-tant working at a government account. When I asked about their ITSM implementation, she responded that there was room for improve-ment. The culprit in both cases? Poor user adoption.

To understand better how RightStar can make a dif-ference in this regard, I reviewed a webinar, “Over-coming the challenges of ITSM Adoption,” hosted by George Spalding, Executive VP Pink Elephant, and Anthony Orr, former BMC Director, Office of the CTO. Interestingly, they began with a poll question: Why are organizations challenged with ITSM adop-tion? The results:

Partners 2% Products 5% Processes 28% People 66%

This is an astounding statistic and reminiscent of the quote form Management guru Peter Drucker, “Culture eats strategy for breakfast.” Yet, RightStar spends 95% of its implementation consulting time on products and processes, and very little time on people. What gives?

To fix user adoption, it is essential to understand what motivates people. According to George Spal-ding, people do what is necessary to get positive feedback and bonuses. People are natrually resis-tant to change and tend to move in the direction of “safety.” In other words, there is an intersection between the needs of people and the organization. That is the “safety point,” when people won’t take

Application Performance Management (APM): Managing the Complexity of Application Delivery

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ing and management tools. Capabilities of these tools should include:

1. RAPID ROOT-CAUSE ANALYSIS. Good APM solu-tions can pinpoint digital service issues quickly, de-termining whether root cause is down to a consumer device, the appli-cation, or the back-end infra-structure work-load.

2. AUTOMATIONTO FIX ISSUES.A good APM solution should provide run-book or task automation features that automat-ically run a script-based action based on an alert or error to fix simple issues.

3. DEEP-DIVE ANALYSIS OF INFRASTRUCTURE AND APPLICATIONS. An APM solution must make it easy for IT to analyze infrastructure and application com-ponents in order to optimize capacity, change, and release management processes.

Today’s customers expect digital services to be availabile and perform well anytime and anywhere. Ultimately, a great APM solution such as BMC’s True-Sight, allows for proactive insight. It should provide the ability to make forward-looking insights through analytic features. The goal is not simply to avoid per-formance, availability, or usability issues from occur-ring in the first place, but also to help make decisions that will improve the end-user experience.

To explore Application Performance Management tools, go to RightStar’s website: http://www.rightstar.com/bmc-truesight-app-visibility-manager/

Successful businesses today are digital businesses.

Leveraging digital technologies to provide quality ser-vices faster to the customer and optimize employee productivity has become the status quo. Unfortunate-ly, current digital services management approaches often cannot support the complex challenges of digi-tal service performance. These approaches tend to be too reactive and fragmented resulting in application problems that negatively affect employee productivity and the end-user experience. The answer is an appli-cation performance management (APM) strategy that can keep pace with digital service challenges.

Essentially, it’s the application and its usability, perfor-mance, and availability that power the digital channels that customers and employees use to access prod-ucts and services. According to a Forrester Research report commissioned by BMC, digital service delivery brings rising application complexity caused primarily by four things:

1. MULTIPLE CODE PLATFORMS. Multiple program-ming languages equal more code issues.

2. MOBILE-FIRST NECESSITY. Managing the availabili-ty and performance of mobile apps is difficult because of multiple types of hardware, operating systems, and network carriers.

3. HYBRID CLOUD ARCHITECTURE. New cloud-based architecture technologies for infrastructure are leading to rising complexities.

4. FASTER RELEASE CADENCE. More changes to a production environment means an increased possi-bility of application code or underlying infrastructure issues.

To improve the delivery of digital services, IT must make it a priority. Effective digital service manage-ment requires an APM strategy that utilizes monitor-

How to Empower YourIT Service Management

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As businesses rely more heavily on technology, thepressure is mounting for IT to solve more complex problems in less time.

IT Service Management (ITSM) systems exist to bring order to an overwhelmed department, but not all of them are optimized to be future-ready.

Here are four critical elements that an empowered ITSM system should offer: 1. Self-Service OptionsSelf-service options can enable users to quickly find the information they need, reducing the volume of service desk calls.

According to BMC, self-service options should include: • Multi-client support on mobile, tablet, and desktop devices • Social communities, where users can help each other solve issues • Searchable knowledge articles that address at least the most common problems• Accurate search capability to easily find solutions

2. Low-Friction CommunicationAccustomed to instantaneous communication and frictionless service, IT customers want answers, in context, wherever they are, on whichever device they are using.

Today’s support channels should include phone, intranet, email, live chat, and mobile apps, in addition to the self-service portals previously mentioned. This allows for faster resolution times and a better service experience for IT’s customers.

With multi-channel support, knowledge capture can be realized. Contextual intranet threads are saved and can be accessed for easy reference at any time.

States BMC, “ongoing knowledge capture ensures that IT continues to improve service management operations, giving users information that is is pro-gressively more useful and more contextual, each time they reach out.”

3. Reporting and DashboardsEffective reporting and user-friendly dashboards are crucial to the success of a business because this information is used to make important deci-sions that impact the future of the business.

BMC suggests that an ITSM solution should pro-vide reporting tools and real-time analytics out of the box to ensure that teams can begin solving problems immediately.

4. Future-Ready PlatformBMC recommends an enterprise cloud platform upon which self-service functionality, low-friction communication, and reporting and dashboards are built. BMC’s Remedyforce ITSM solution is built on the future-ready Salesforce1 cloud platform.

The advantages of a future-ready cloud platform include no-hassle infrastructure management opti-mized for the mobile age, easy administration and reporting across multiple aspects of the business, and a secure, multi-tenant architecture that can scale to grow with your organization.

To explore the features and benefits of BMCRemedyforce, go to http://www.rightstar.com/products/bmc-products/bmc-remedyforce-ser-vice-desk/

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Customer Story:Buckeye Partners, L.P.

Buckeye Partners, petroleum distributors, slashed audit preparation time by 95% with the power ofBMC Remedyforce and the expertise of RightStar

BUSINESS CHALLENGEManaging over 6,200 miles of petroleum pipeline distribution and 100 truck loading terminals in the U.S., Buckeye Partners is subject to compliance with a number of industry standards and govern-ment regulations. IT plays a vital role in demon-strating compliance with these mandates by providing detailed data for the rigorous audits that occur twice each year. Buckeye needed to auto-mate incident, problem, and change management to transform its audit preparation from a laborious, 25-hour manual effort to a simple auto-reporting process.

“Remedyforce has been such a big hit that

we are using more seats not only because

we have more departments on-line but be-

cause we can now justify how busy we are

and we’ve hired more IT employees. The end

result: improved customer satisfaction.”

SOLUTIONBuckeye chose BMC Remedyforce and Right-Star Systems to revamp its ITSM processes and address the industry’s demanding audit require-ments. Remedyforce delivers robust ITSM function-ality through the Salesforce.com cloud platform. Automated incident, problem, and change man-agement processes enable the staff to capture data related to these IT disciplines and generate detailed reports with just a few clicks.

BUSINESS IMPACTAutomation through Remedy-force has yielded dramatic efficiency and productiv-ity gains, positioning the current staff to accommo-date the company’s rapid growth.

• Ready availability of detailed reports cuts audit preparation time from up to 25 hours to just one hour.

• ITSM in the cloud frees up data center space, reduces power consumption, and saves staff time that would otherwise be spent on implementation, management, and upgrades.

• Meaningful reports and dashboards support data-driven decision making.

• With data capture and reporting, staff members gain visibility into SLAs, enabling themto improve SLA compliance from 65% to 80%.

• All change request activities are captured, provid-ing a complete audit trail forcompliance purposes.

“We’re a small IT group with a lot of things to man-age,” says Eric Gleason, service desk manager at Buckeye Partners. “A SaaS solution like Remedy-force makes sense for us because we don’t have to spend staff time on implementation, ongoing ad-ministration, and upgrades. We know that patches will be put in on time and, when an upgrade occurs, we know it’s been thoroughly tested.”

To explore BMC Remedyforce, go to http://www.rightstar.com/products/bmc-products/bmc-remedyforce-service-desk/

Interview with Brett Winston, Head of Product Developmentat RightStar Systems.

What is RightStar’s ScanStar? ScanStar is an efficient, cost-effective method to track fixed asset inventories of capital equipment, computers, furniture and other resources. ScanStar exploits the accuracy of barcode readers to more accurately track your assets (configuration items) through the use of common optical barcode tags. The application will allow you to record the movement of assets from one location and/or user to another and provides a record of actions associated with an item throughout its lifecycle.

Can you discuss the origins of the ScanStar product?ScanStar is the next generation of RightStar’s flagship product “MagicWand” for BMC Service Desk Express. MagicWand was based on a custom solution written for the US Office of the President in 2004 in order to provide better visibility of fixed assets within the department.

What types of organizations benefit most from ScanStar?ScanStar is used by state and local government agencies, and in the private sector pharmaceutical, insurance, education, banking . . . you name it. Anyone with a need to track physical assets can benefit from ScanStar.

How long does it take to install ScanStar?Up to four hours of implementation assistance and training on ScanStar are included with the annual subscription price. Mid-market platforms like FootPrints and Remedyforce usually take about this long. ScanStar for Remedy ITSM (or any platform for that matter) can take longer if the desired form configuration deviates significantly from the default attributes supplied “out of the box”. Are there any future plans for ScanStar in place?Absolutely! We are constantly improving the product and a major new addition is on its way – ScanStar for smartphones. Stay tuned for Android and iOS ver-sions which will support NFC, geotagging, native camera support and more.

To request a Free ScanStar Trial, visit RightStar’s website at: http://www.rightstar.com/request-a-free-30-day-scanstar-trial/

RightStar’s ScanStar