What is Enterprise Service Management?

I’m sure many of you are familiar with the concept of ITSM, but for those that aren’t, let’s do a quick review! ITSM stands for IT Service Management, which essentially describes ​​how IT teams manage the end-to-end delivery of IT services to their end-users. In simpler terms, ITSM is the practice of delivering IT services to customers, both internal and external facing.

During the process of ITSM, IT services can be set up to be delivered to internal employees, for example when employees have tech issues that are preventing them from completing their work. These IT services can also be delivered to external customers, as well, like a financial institution resolving technical issues that a customer is facing on their online portal. 

Now that we’ve reviewed IT Service Management, let’s dive into Enterprise Service Management …

Enterprise Service Management, often referred to as ESM, is an extension of IT Service Management and the ITSM principles. This extension provides additional functionalities within the IT service delivery process in order to enable better service delivery for business teams throughout enterprise organizations, such as HR, legal, marketing, and finance. An example of Enterprise Service Management is building out a service desk throughout an organization that can be utilized across all departments.  Simply put, ESM builds on IT workflows in order to better manage service delivery with a service management tool. 

Comparing ITSM with ESM

I want to make it a point that instead of looking at the two concepts as ITSM vs. ESM, it’s important to shift to the mindset that Enterprise Service Management functions as an addition to IT Service management … Think of it as ITSM plus ESM. 

The main objective that a great ITSM implementation solves is unifying all teams throughout organizations by standardizing services and streamlining workflows. Enterprise Service Management pulls the best, most tried, and true processes from existing ITSM principles, and adopts these principles to satisfy the unique business needs of each department. This ensures that everyone throughout the organization is on the same page and can have access to information that will assist their needs. 

How does ESM enable Digital Transformation?

As businesses start to scale and embark on digital transformation, the gaps between different departments start to become more pronounced. Although ESM isn’t a full-scaled digital transformation, there are a number of ways in which ESM facilitates digital transformation.

1. Clarifying services and improvements

At enterprise-level organizations, there isn’t much visibility into the day-to-day of what each team does for the rest of the company. Instead of pinging your coworkers on Slack for certain documentation or requesting services, ESM alleviates that pain by assisting organizations in articulating and providing those services consistently through a unified portal, which is accessible 24/7.

2. Breaks down internal silos

Oftentimes, different teams throughout an organization must work closely with one another to deliver services to end-users. This process is usually done manually, which can be prone to errors. ESM defines a consistent workflow with an automated process, ensuring that mistakes aren’t being made. 

3. Uses automation to drive efficiency

Automating a process not only speeds up the delivery of services but when each department has a display of their services through a digital catalog, processes are also identified while everything is tracked for easy review.  

4. Streamline control and governance

What is tracked can also be measured, so having a system that allows you to define services across all teams gives organizations the capability to centralize and streamline work. 

This is just the starting point of Enterprise Service Management and the functionalities it provides for service processes. Please contact us for additional information - We’re here to help your organization succeed with Atlassian.