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itSMF USA Releases New Study on Service Management Adoption

itSMF USA has released the results of a new IT service management study. The study, conducted this year in partnership with Forrester Research, was created to help guide infrastructure and operations professionals through a better understanding of people, process and technology trends and best practices.

The study focused on current and future adoption of IT service management principles, including effective ITIL practices in use amongst itSMF USA’s member base. The resulting report, The State Of IT Service Management In 2011, was published by Forrester Research, Inc.

The study addressed a range of current topics for IT today, including the role of IT service management in bridging the gap between application and infrastructure teams, the level of ITIL process adoption and their relationship to benefits realized, the role of training and certification in adoption, the effect of executive sponsorship level on both adoption and benefits realized, the adoption and impact of ITIL v3 and the impact of tools on ITSM adoption.

“Data was collected from 491 qualified ITSM professionals who are heavily involved in ITSM efforts. The results clearly offer empirical evidence that ITSM offers significant benefits to the organizations and to themselves“, said Doug Tedder, President-Elect of itSMF USA.

Some insights from the research:

• The adoption of IT infrastructure library (ITIL)-based programs and certifications are mainstream, with IT service quality, productivity, and reputation with business leaders significantly enhanced because of it.

• More work needs to be done on certain execution elements, most notably change management. Execution still causes too many incidents. About 70% of all incidents are the result of a change. 58% of the subjects say over 10% of their incidents are caused by change. 25% are excessive (over 40% of incidents) and a beleaguered 22% don’t know. SaaS is viewed very favorably as a service desk software delivery option. 96% were satisfied or very satisfied with SaaS, whereas the numbers for traditional software models and homebrewed tools all hovered around 70%.

• Despite some dissatisfaction with service desk, buyers are unlikely to switch vendors. 57% said they would not switch and 21% said they would. 22% did not know.

• The anchor-boutique “shopping mall” model for management tools seems popular. Major
vendors are well entrenched, but 37% will fill gaps in their portfolios with smaller boutique
vendors.

• 51% of ITSM efforts are driven primarily by IT or business executives.

• ITIL has had an overwhelming positive impact on organizational productivity: 85% positive and 2% negative

• 70% received a positive salary increase in the past year with 31% over 5% (The general US population fell and general IT salaries were flat.)

• 77% indicated a positive relationship between their Application Development and Operations teams. This indicates DevOps success is far stronger in ITSM-focused organizations than in the general enterprise.

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itSMF USA Releases New Study on Service Management Adoption

itSMF USA has released the results of a new IT service management study. The study, conducted this year in partnership with Forrester Research, was created to help guide infrastructure and operations professionals through a better understanding of people, process and technology trends and best practices.

The study focused on current and future adoption of IT service management principles, including effective ITIL practices in use amongst itSMF USA’s member base. The resulting report, The State Of IT Service Management In 2011, was published by Forrester Research, Inc.

The study addressed a range of current topics for IT today, including the role of IT service management in bridging the gap between application and infrastructure teams, the level of ITIL process adoption and their relationship to benefits realized, the role of training and certification in adoption, the effect of executive sponsorship level on both adoption and benefits realized, the adoption and impact of ITIL v3 and the impact of tools on ITSM adoption.

“Data was collected from 491 qualified ITSM professionals who are heavily involved in ITSM efforts. The results clearly offer empirical evidence that ITSM offers significant benefits to the organizations and to themselves“, said Doug Tedder, President-Elect of itSMF USA.

Some insights from the research:

• The adoption of IT infrastructure library (ITIL)-based programs and certifications are mainstream, with IT service quality, productivity, and reputation with business leaders significantly enhanced because of it.

• More work needs to be done on certain execution elements, most notably change management. Execution still causes too many incidents. About 70% of all incidents are the result of a change. 58% of the subjects say over 10% of their incidents are caused by change. 25% are excessive (over 40% of incidents) and a beleaguered 22% don’t know. SaaS is viewed very favorably as a service desk software delivery option. 96% were satisfied or very satisfied with SaaS, whereas the numbers for traditional software models and homebrewed tools all hovered around 70%.

• Despite some dissatisfaction with service desk, buyers are unlikely to switch vendors. 57% said they would not switch and 21% said they would. 22% did not know.

• The anchor-boutique “shopping mall” model for management tools seems popular. Major
vendors are well entrenched, but 37% will fill gaps in their portfolios with smaller boutique
vendors.

• 51% of ITSM efforts are driven primarily by IT or business executives.

• ITIL has had an overwhelming positive impact on organizational productivity: 85% positive and 2% negative

• 70% received a positive salary increase in the past year with 31% over 5% (The general US population fell and general IT salaries were flat.)

• 77% indicated a positive relationship between their Application Development and Operations teams. This indicates DevOps success is far stronger in ITSM-focused organizations than in the general enterprise.

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According to Auvik's 2025 IT Trends Report, 60% of IT professionals feel at least moderately burned out on the job, with 43% stating that their workload is contributing to work stress. At the same time, many IT professionals are naming AI and machine learning as key areas they'd most like to upskill ...

Businesses that face downtime or outages risk financial and reputational damage, as well as reducing partner, shareholder, and customer trust. One of the major challenges that enterprises face is implementing a robust business continuity plan. What's the solution? The answer may lie in disaster recovery tactics such as truly immutable storage and regular disaster recovery testing ...

IT spending is expected to jump nearly 10% in 2025, and organizations are now facing pressure to manage costs without slowing down critical functions like observability. To meet the challenge, leaders are turning to smarter, more cost effective business strategies. Enter stage right: OpenTelemetry, the missing piece of the puzzle that is no longer just an option but rather a strategic advantage ...

Amidst the threat of cyberhacks and data breaches, companies install several security measures to keep their business safely afloat. These measures aim to protect businesses, employees, and crucial data. Yet, employees perceive them as burdensome. Frustrated with complex logins, slow access, and constant security checks, workers decide to completely bypass all security set-ups ...

Image
Cloudbrink's Personal SASE services provide last-mile acceleration and reduction in latency

In MEAN TIME TO INSIGHT Episode 13, Shamus McGillicuddy, VP of Research, Network Infrastructure and Operations, at EMA discusses hybrid multi-cloud networking strategy ... 

In high-traffic environments, the sheer volume and unpredictable nature of network incidents can quickly overwhelm even the most skilled teams, hindering their ability to react swiftly and effectively, potentially impacting service availability and overall business performance. This is where closed-loop remediation comes into the picture: an IT management concept designed to address the escalating complexity of modern networks ...

In 2025, enterprise workflows are undergoing a seismic shift. Propelled by breakthroughs in generative AI (GenAI), large language models (LLMs), and natural language processing (NLP), a new paradigm is emerging — agentic AI. This technology is not just automating tasks; it's reimagining how organizations make decisions, engage customers, and operate at scale ...

In the early days of the cloud revolution, business leaders perceived cloud services as a means of sidelining IT organizations. IT was too slow, too expensive, or incapable of supporting new technologies. With a team of developers, line of business managers could deploy new applications and services in the cloud. IT has been fighting to retake control ever since. Today, IT is back in the driver's seat, according to new research by Enterprise Management Associates (EMA) ...

In today's fast-paced and increasingly complex network environments, Network Operations Centers (NOCs) are the backbone of ensuring continuous uptime, smooth service delivery, and rapid issue resolution. However, the challenges faced by NOC teams are only growing. In a recent study, 78% state network complexity has grown significantly over the last few years while 84% regularly learn about network issues from users. It is imperative we adopt a new approach to managing today's network experiences ...

Image
Broadcom

From growing reliance on FinOps teams to the increasing attention on artificial intelligence (AI), and software licensing, the Flexera 2025 State of the Cloud Report digs into how organizations are improving cloud spend efficiency, while tackling the complexities of emerging technologies ...