Okay now I am not at all suggesting that every IT Organization should adopt a creepy mascot like some fast food joints. However Fast Food serves Millions of people on the run quickly from a menu for 1-3 prices per package in less than 10 minutes you can get the "regular", "super size", and "what are you crazy to buy this size" proportions. When your business is based in tightly packaged service for a low price, the service delivery becomes very efficient.

One of my favorite such companies is "Sonic" a company really good at hiring remarkable people and for being number one. Sonic has now 30000 drive ins open and has earned the recognition of top 100 Best Mid-Cap Stocks and Best Smalll companies list by Forbes, and the number 1 in the Enterpreneurs Franchise list for their indsutry. Sonic's average unit sales of more than $1M. But it wasn't always that way. Sonic did not have a stream lined menu, appearance, or service experience until 1994's "re-branding" effort. This fast food place offers well more than Fast Food. One of the greater thinkers in the service industry is Johann Stoessel, whom I have had the pleasure of knowing through Help Desk Institute-- Johann cultivates uncommon leadership and loyalty as he had aspired to make his organization the most beloved support organization for the value they delivered!

Simplified Service Management means creating a better experience by creating a better service package. Imagine if you went to a Sonic to order a Toaster Sandwich, Chocolate Coke, and a side of tator tots, and each part of the order was taken by a different person focussed only on what they made-- Toaster Sandwich from the grill gal, Tator Tots from the Fry Guy, and can I add a Chocolate Coke? Yes but we need to dispatch our Drink Dude, it will cost more, but we can't tell you how much more, he will be with you in a moment.

Sonic has figured out the requirements to offer one meal with all utensils, packaging, condiments, and add ons for one simple price from it's organiztion. It requires service management operations that can define and deliver their jobs with the same well architected experience.

IT has been able to hide behind it's own complexity and more and more, they are adopting a more efficient, effective and coherent way of delivering service. It is clear that to keep a system running, you need service and support for hardware, software, and Operating system from One IT. Service and support is in the business of selling the solution people need, not divvying out the components or explanations why the components cant be delivered seamlessly.

Customers simply don't go to a fast food joint to order bun, hamburger, cheese slice, 1 tablespoon ketchup, deyhdrated minced onion, paper square.
IT Customers expect us to work out the processes to make the meal and it's packaged pricing work into categories of small, medium and large.

Service Management attributes when well packaged look like a change friendly ad agile infrastructure that delivers clearly services, available and sustainable services for the lifetime of the business. Application Layer, Hardware Layer, OS, and Infrastructure should unite to form the components of the SYSTEM people really want to buy-- full connectivity, application access, and use for the times that they need it.

Over provisioning, Under Provisioning or failing to recognizing key elements of cost and service implications are all symptoms that your organizations needs to approach a Simplified Service Management. Starts with the Service Catalog of components and service relationships, and extends to include cost factors (proactive savings, reactive costs, etc). IT Infrastructure Library has the common packaging that organizations can apply to adopt better Service Management, Change Management, Incident Mangement, Financial Management, and Capacity Management. Imagine creating a solid Configuration Management Database, setting the key process control points to keep the data clean when something is being added, changed, or deleted.. That goes a long way, then you layer in continuous process improvement of the Service Level Performance Metrics, you capture missing process defects, and yes over timee, you can offer a lower price for less money, because you have found the key in simplicity, lies in creating less customer viewable complexity, and more customer viewable value.

Dawn Mular http://linkedin.com/in/dmular