I received a comment on my last blog entry that got me thinking about the cultural shift that ITIL is forcing IT organizations to make. One facet of this cultural shift is that IT organizations need to bridge the communication gap between IT and the business, as well as change the perception of their organization held by end users and colleagues on the business side of the corporation.

When I worked on the Operations side of IT, I often encountered difficulty working with colleagues who were not fond of IT and people who worked in IT for various reasons. Whatever the reasons were, I found that the common theme that I was facing was that there was a communication gap between IT and the business. This issue in turn made it appear that IT was difficult to work with. In my opinion, the problem was on both sides of the house, IT and the business were struggling to understand each other's role in achieving the common business goals.

Here is how Service Level Management (SLM) can help improve communication between IT and business so they can improve their overall relationship.  During the requirements gathering and design phases of implementing an SLM process the business and IT should be encouraged to work together to define the service offering that IT will provide, and the business goal it is supposed to support.  During this process, IT needs to learn and demonstrate understanding of the business needs outlined by their customer by:

• Creating a written description of the service offering (this description should include a summary of the business case)
• Creating and documenting the process to deliver this service
• Creating a budget for creating and maintaining  the service offering
• Identifying the resources responsible for delivering and maintaining the service
• Creating KPI(s) to prove the service is being delivered to the negotiated service levels and during the negotiated business hours

In addition, the business will gain a better understanding of the costs and level of effort for IT to deliver a service to the business based upon mutually agreed upon business needs.  This collaboration will also give both IT and the business to share responsibility and equal stake in the success of the service offering, and hopefully increase respect and understanding for the two sides of the business.