ITSM Articles

ITSM Benchmarking

ITSM Benchmarking – Your Chance to Get Involved

How would you rate your organization’s ITSM or ITIL adoption? Not just in terms of process or practice adoption, but in serving the parent business. PeopleCert has built an ITIL Performance Benchmarking Model with defined ways to calculate the key metrics. This article covers how the model works and how ITSM teams can get involved.
What I Learned from SDI SPARK26

Superheroes, Service Desks, and Chaos Monkeys – What I Learned from SDI SPARK26

The Service Desk Institute held its annual SPARK conference in Birmingham in March. Vawns Murphy captures her pick of the best sessions, the presenters worth listening to a second time, and the practical takeaways that stood out over three days of talks. This article is her selected version of the event for anyone who couldn’t get there in person.
Break the 1–3x ITSM Implementation Cost Rule

How AI Will Break the 1–3x ITSM Implementation Cost Rule

The rule of thumb in ITSM has long been that implementation costs one to three times the software license. Richard Mendis of Bytemethod.ai makes the case that agentic AI finally breaks this calculation, by taking on the configuration, documentation, and maintenance work that consumes the bulk of an implementation budget. The article explains where the savings show up first.
AI Help Desk Software

AI Help Desk Software: How LLMs, AI Agents & Chatbots Are Transforming IT Support

AI help desks powered by LLMs and AI agents are being rolled out to automate IT support, reduce Tier 1 tickets, cut operational costs, and scale support operations without adding headcount. Jeff Hume looks at where these systems are already delivering, what the current limitations look like, and how to think about them if you’re evaluating options for your own service desk.
The Genealogy of AI Slop

The Genealogy of AI Slop: Generative AI Didn’t Invent It – It Learned It

There is a growing chorus complaining about “AI slop” in IT service management (ITSM). This article by Ian Clayton looks at how we had “slop” before we had “AI slop” and the connectivity between the two.
Illustrated checklist with colorful crayons representing the key ITIL (Version 5) changes from ITIL 4

ITIL (Version 5) Changes Explained: 20 Important Changes from ITIL 4

The release of the ITIL (Version 5) Foundation publication has brought new interest in what changed from ITIL 4. This article walks through 20 changes in ITIL (Version 5) compared to ITIL 4, including updates to the Value System, the new certification paths, AI governance, and how the framework now handles the practices practitioners already know.
The Hidden Cost of IT “Papercuts”: Why ITSM Automation Is a Business Continuity Strategy

The Hidden Cost of IT “Papercuts”: Why ITSM Automation Is a Business Continuity Strategy

It’s the small issues that eat away at your team’s capacity: password resets, access tweaks, profile changes, and “just a quick question” tickets that never make a headline but never stop arriving either. Lauren Okruch explains why the compounded impact of these papercuts is a real business continuity risk, and how ITSM automation delivers more upside on this class of work than the flashier use cases.
AI in ITSM

AI in ITSM: How AI Is Transforming IT Service Management

AI is changing IT service management, from automation and predictive incidents to smarter knowledge management and better end-user experiences. Daniel Burley walks through where the technology fits in an ITSM setup today, what it does well, what it still gets wrong, and how to think about where to invest first if you’re at the early end of the adoption curve.
FinOps and ITSM

What the State of FinOps 2026 Means for ITSM

The FinOps Foundation has released its sixth annual State of FinOps survey, and ITSM is explicitly named as one of the key disciplines with which FinOps teams are now collaborating. If you work in ITSM and you haven’t been paying attention to FinOps, now’s the time to start.
ITIL 4 Service Value System Explained

ITIL 4 and ITIL 5 Service Value Systems (SVSs) Explained: Guiding Principles, Practices, and Service Value Chain

Much changed in ITIL 4, and there’s a lot to get your head around. This article explains what the ITIL 4 service value system is and what it contains: the guiding principles, governance, service value chain, management practices, and continual improvement. It also covers how the SVS evolves in ITIL (Version 5) and what practitioners should watch for.
Illustrated ITIL control tower rising above a digital landscape representing the ITIL (Version 5) framework

ITIL (Version 5) Explained: What’s New, What’s Changed, and Why It Matters

ITIL (Version 5) is here, and the questions from practitioners have started. This article works through the most common ones: what has changed, what has stayed the same, and what the key differences from ITIL 4 are. Roman Jouravlev, editor of ITIL and creator of the Conversations with Giants series, walks through the practical implications for anyone already running ITIL 4.
AI Survey 2026

AI Survey 2026: The Rise of Agentic AI Adoption in ITSM

We’re running a second 2026 AI survey just four months after our previous one. It repeats a similar AI survey from early 2025. This time, however, there’s a far greater focus on where the ITSM community is with Agentic AI rather than AI per se.

2026 ITSM Trends: What the Community Actually Wants Help With

Every year we ask the ITSM community what topics they want help with, and the 2026 results are in. This article covers what the community is asking for, how priorities have changed over six years, and what it all means. Spoiler: GenAI has fallen off a cliff and nobody wants to talk about people anymore.
The MSP Agentic AI Execution Gap

The MSP Agentic AI Execution Gap in Service Delivery

70% of MSPs say they’re using agentic AI. Only 10% are primarily using it where it counts. And according to new Omdia poll data, MSP’s customers are already further ahead. The report digs into the execution gap, the cost of hesitation, and why investors are increasingly factoring AI maturity into MSP valuations.
Sovereignty-First ITSM

Sovereignty-First ITSM: How Geopolitical Risk Is Reshaping Service Management in 2026

Sovereignty-first ITSM might be a new term in your service management vocabulary, but geopolitical risk is reshaping IT service management. Learn how it protects your organization’s data, helps ensure resilience, and preserves ITIL alignment.