Industry averages on KPI's

[changeborg]

We have been tracking some very specific KPI's against Unplanned Changes and Emergency Changes over the last 18 or so months. As we are approaching year end, management has requested that we see how our trend looks against that of other global companies (we process ~10k changes per year). When we began tracking the data, both Unplanned and Emergency changes were WAY out of control at around 15% globally but in some cases 25% for 2 of our regions. Through formalized training, increased focus on bad behaviors and buy-in from management we were able to get both where I feel is under control at around 5%

I've done some digging around at the various IT statistics and auditing organizations but have not been able to find any sort of IT industry 'average'. Can anyone here either point me in the right direction for official stats or would you mind sharing where you are with yours?

Thanks in advance![/list]

[Diarmid]

i'll be brief for reasons expressed in another post today. there is no such thing as an industry standard or norm for things like this, even for global operations like yours.

This is because the factors that affect the figures are so varied. Comparing yourself with someone else could make you complacent as easily as the opposite.

Your management are following a very sub-optimal tack with this approach.

What you have done so far sounds like good progress. Just keep finding ways to improve further and let the rest of the world fall by the wayside.
_________________
"Method goes far to prevent trouble in business: for it makes the task easy, hinders confusion, saves abundance of time, and instructs those that have business depending, both what to do and what to hope."
William Penn 1644-1718

[changeborg]

Thanks Diarmid. This was the very conversation I had with my manager about the topic yesterday. Unfortunately we have a tendency to try and compare ourselves against other organizations to measure our maturity and performance. While this can be useful, I agree that it can make us complacent and lose focus. Management seems eager to measure success by how we stack up against others rather than asking the simple questions of 'what do we/out customers want or expect'.

Thanks again!

[UKVIKING]

Tell your boss - 3 out of statistic is made up and 35% of management believes the statistics anyway
_________________
John Hardesty
ITSM Manager's Certificate (Red Badge)

Change Management is POWER & CONTROL. /....evil laughter

[mc2348]

Changeborg,

There is a body of knowledge addressing the metrics you seek. I found 2.


The IT Process Institute (ITPI) advises in its benchmarking study that the percentage of emergency changes should not comprise more than 5 percent of total changes.

Additionally, Rich Schiesser, a 30 year veteran of leading major computer centers including Northrop Grumman Corporation et al and author of the book “IT Systems Management”, maintains an IT organization is operating in a reactive environment when the number of emergency changes exceeds 15%.

However, Mark Twain said "There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics."

[LesleyMills]

We have what I would call a very high number of changes that whilst successful (the change itself was successful as described) they cause unforseen issues that then have to be fixed, often urgently.

I'm wanting to go back to the offending department and discuss their failed changes but I'm keen to get some benchmarks for companies who are perhaps not highly practiced with ITIL but are nonetheless not just starting out; to find out what the industry average is for an acceptable number of changes that in themselves cause incidents and so further changes.

I know this is all subjective but I'm keen to see if there is anything out there that I can use in my argument that the number we are experiencing is too high. Thoughts anyone?


Thanks,

Lesley

[Diarmid]

There are unlikely to be any useful figures out there, but I can say with some certainty that the number you are looking for is zero.
_________________
"Method goes far to prevent trouble in business: for it makes the task easy, hinders confusion, saves abundance of time, and instructs those that have business depending, both what to do and what to hope."
William Penn 1644-1718