According to the dictionary, “agility” is defined as the ability to move quickly and easily. When this is applied to IT and software asset management (ITAM/SAM) it involves being prepared to respond quickly to business direction or technology changes and risk.

The ability to support transformation activities is a hallmark of an agile ITAM/SAM program. Legacy processes and workflows that are not predictive and proactive won’t work in an ITAMOps environment.

Here are a few questions to get you thinking about whether or not your ITAM/SAM program needs to evolve to support business requirements and a move toward digital transformation. These aren’t strictly yes/no questions but are nuanced to take into account any unique factors about your organization.

  • How frequently is the data in your tools updated? Something to think about – is it daily, after changes, weekly, monthly quarterly, or annually?
  • Are you conducting full physical inventories? Something to think about – a wall to wall count of IT equipment, sample of users and devices, include remote sites and users, or not at all.
  • Is unused software regularly harvested off of devices? Something to think about – is it installed because it is part of the standard build, do you have specified time range for use, can you lower costs by not purchasing new licenses?
  • How long does it take to negotiate a new IT vendor agreement? Something to think about – do you have a standard set of terms and agreements, do you receive alerts when products are discontinued?
  • Do users have to wait more than 24 hours to receive an asset they have ordered? Something to think about – do you have an asset catalog, an exception process for out of band assets?
  • Is the asset manager involved in change management planning? Something to think about – are license reviews part of new product rollouts?

To learn more about how your organization can become more agile stop by the Ivanti booth at Gartner’s ITAM Summit in Nashville Sept 11-12 or see the presentation that, Patricia Adams, ITAM Evangelist with Ivanti, will be presenting Five Steps to Develop an Agile ITAM/SAM Program at Gartner’s UK event Sept 20-21.

Contact info:

Patricia Adams
Ivanti IT Asset Management Evangelist
Mobile: 203-249-2923
Follow me on Twitter: @patriciaadams
Follow Ivanti on Twitter: @GoIvanti