Workshop: Running IT Like A Business
Length: 4 hours
Format: Interactive presentation, hands-on modeling exercises
Delivery Method: Live interactive web conference
Materials: Service Catalog Design Toolkit + Service Costing Toolkit
Price: $999
Date and Time: No dates currently scheduled. Please email store@lontra.com if you are interested. Valuable materials included! For just $999, this workshop includes:

• The Premium Service Catalog Design Best Practices Toolkit (a $399 value)
• The Premium Service Costing Best Practices Toolkit (a $399 value)
• 4 hours of hands-on interactive instruction from an IT management expert

What You Will Learn

"Running IT Like A Business" -- it is a popular concept today, and you have probably heard what it can do for you: cut costs, streamline IT operations, align IT with your business customers, and increase customer satisfaction. But what exactly does running IT like a business entail? How do you transition from your current IT management practices to a more "businesslike" framework? How does your ITIL® program help to achieve this goal? And how do you measure the benefits? This workshop, based on an upcoming book, will answer all of these questions. By the end of this information-packed 4-hour session, you will learn:

• What does running IT like a business mean? -- The substance behind the buzz.
• The implementation roadmap. -- Just as with anything else, there is a right way and a wrong way to go about "Running IT Like A Business." You will learn, through a series of hands-on examples and case studies, how to leverage best-practice ideas and processes that lead to a more customer-centric, business-oriented IT organization -- from constructing a hierarchical service portfolio taxonomy; to building a multi-dimensional cost model and achieving cost transparency; to initiating demand-based budgeting and consumption-based chargeback.
• The maintenance essentials. -- With a new IT management paradigm comes a new IT culture, and a new set of management processes necessary to keep the organization running. You will learn what these processes are and how they can be put to work at your organization. You will also learn how to leverage your existing ITIL program in this effort.
• The clear and present benefits. -- You will learn, through the analysis of detailed examples, exactly how your IT organization will benefit from following this model, and how you can use metrics and benchmarking to measure these benefits.

Who Should Come

This workshop will be useful to anyone interested in running their IT organization like a business, and realizing all the benefits that come with this paradigm shift. It gives a clear picture and a holistic, start-to-finish methodology showing exactly what this means. What we describe in this workshop is really what we think is the right way to run IT, and the topics covered here will be useful to anyone involved in IT management.

Workshop Outline

Below is the outline of this workshop. The instructor may choose not follow this outline precisely, but will cover all the topics listed. We also usually include two 5-10 minute breaks at various points during the workshop.

1. Introduction
   Interactive overview of the participants' specific business situations; overview of the workshop agenda and goals.
2. What does running IT like a business mean?
   You've heard the term -- but what does running IT like a business really mean? We bring you the substance behind the buzz.
3. Why run IT like a business?
   We will go over the many reasons for transitioning to IT to a more "businesslike" framework and embracing this new paradigm of running IT operations.
4. The implementation roadmap and Lontra's methodology
   We explain our unique, holistic approach to running IT like a business, and present a complete start-to-finish roadmap for accomplishing this transition.
5. Defining your services
   Every business needs to know what products/services it offers to its customers. We will go over how to create this service catalog by balancing what you can do with your resources with what your customers are looking for.
6. Service costing and pricing
   Another essential thing for every business to understand is how much it costs to make its products. We will go over this in detail, including a hands-on costing exercise.
7. Demand management, business planning, and driver-based budgeting
   Properly defining and costing your services are the fundamentals of running IT like a business. After you have these basics in place, you can really start managing your "business". We will talk about what this entails, including demand-driven budgeting, business scenario planning, etc.
8. The maintenance essentials
   With a new IT management paradigm comes a new IT culture, and new management processes necessary to keep the organization running. We will go over these processes, as well as how you can leverage your existing ITIL program in this effort.

If you have any questions about this workshop, please email us at workshop@lontra.com