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ServiceNow upgrades are an inevitability. Like any project, there are definite risks to rushing into one unprepared, be it unexpected costs or struggling to meet deadlines. In this webinar Quality Clouds will be going over how you can better handle your upgrade process using automation and helping you avoid some common pitfalls. We’ll also be sharing some of our favourite new features in Quebec!
Join us on 18th February at 4 PM GMT | 5 PM CET | 11 AM ET | 8 AM PT, where we’ll be discussing and demonstrating how automation can help deliver a seamless ServiceNow upgrade.
Sign up now for your chance to learn more about the topic and put your questions to our experts. Limited places are available!
Upgrade Project Management
Poorly managed IT projects can go disastrously wrong. 1 in 6 IT projects have a cost overrun of 200% for instance, with the vast majority of companies having no formal approach to project management in place.
One crucial question managers should be asking themselves is what they want to achieve by upgrading. Obviously, as we’ve discussed before, there is an incentive because of ServiceNow’s upgrade policy. Falling behind can mean you lose critical support if anything goes wrong.
The reason for 37% of project failure is a lack of clear goals. If your goal is simply ‘to not fall behind’ then is that specific enough? We’ve seen instances that take several weeks or months to upgrade. In such cases, taking a look at how to prevent the same occurring next time is a smart investment. One key thing to remember about SaaS project management is that you are dealing with an ever evolving project. What you do now will impact your next project and many beyond. This is why planning is so vital. Your actions now influence the complexity of future projects. A lack of clear strategic platform goals will result in significant problems down the line.
How to Plan
Now we’ve discussed why you need to plan, let’s discuss how to go about it. Firstly, you’re going to need full transparency over your instances to properly plan your project. Some things to consider might be:
- How deviated from out of the box is my instance?
- Which currently customized functionality will be outdated?
- Are there any particular areas of technical debt I’d like to reduce?
- Which integrations do I need to keep track of?
There are numerous other considerations, but the important part is that you need to have a way of analyzing large amounts of information to make smart decisions. Gathering information is often both difficult and tedious which means it’s not uncommon for things to be overlooked either due to a lack of time or simply human error.
That’s why adding automation into your upgrade process can be vitally important when you’re planning. Not only do you save significant time on data gathering (which your team will thank you for!), you also achieve a more accurate picture. You’re no longer trying to build on uncertain foundations – you have full control and can properly assess any risks.
Conclusion
Upgrades require a well thought approach to be carried out efficiently and set up your platform for future success. To learn more about how to do that using automated solutions like Quality Clouds, make sure to sign up to the webinar. Register Now!
