The rapid pace of digital transformation drives dynamic collaboration in the business environment. Technology become an important tool for business continuity as many companies rely on their work in IT. A similar condition is also experienced by customers which have found themselves relying more on IT to cover their demands. Customers need comprehensive information about IT Service offered, meanwhile, companies need an IT Service that focused on market demands and the company's capabilities to excel in the market. The increasing complexity of requirements combined with high-cost pressures in IT causes a more efficient delivery of IT Services (Uebernickel et. al., 2006). Therefore, the role of the IT Service Catalog is important to clarify the IT Service provided by companies and support their overall business model.
By developing an IT Service Catalog, companies are able to deliver a customer-centric IT Service Catalog with a clear view and details of services that could win the market and customers have a better view of what services could fit their demands. In order to develop better services, IT Providers should improve their communication with their customers to improve their end-user experience. IT Service Catalog is one of the tools that are useful to help IT Service Providers to achieve technology-services advancement.
IT Service Catalog
In the framework of IT Service Management, it is necessary for IT service providers (internal company IT departments or external IT service providers) present and describe their processes and services in a standardized and structured way (Nissen et. al., 2015). The core objective of the IT Service Catalog is to simplify the process of IT Service requests and usage for both customers and the catalog. With sufficient information and clear timelines, the IT Services Catalog enables companies to provide good solutions for problems or demands faced by the customers.
IT Service Catalog usually has two views: a customer-facing view and a technical view. The ITIL framework differentiates between two points of view concerning the IT Service Catalog:
1. Business/Customer View: Customer's point of view; overview of the services available for the customer and their relation to business departments and processes.
2. Technical/supporting view: Provider's point of view; overview of the services offered to the customer as well as the supporting internal services, configuration elements, and IT service processes.
Customer view refers to what end users see when they're accessing the IT Service Catalog. It underlines the connection between customers' demands and services offered, as well as supporting features that they can use to optimize the service they choose to use. The technical view refers to what the IT Departments or Resources see when they're using the IT Service Catalog during the work activity.
There are 3 models of the IT Service Catalog starting from the broader component to a more detailed component in order to grasp the complete features of each service as follows.
Service Category
Service Category contains a logical grouping of services. It can be utilized to be in line with the infrastructure's objective. To make the budgeting and service processes easier, the IT service provider should understand the significance of these high-level categories. While some companies may want to make these classifications apparent to end users, others may choose to do otherwise and may even use different groupings. These groups ought to be in line with the broader service structure and represent the company's strategic objectives. Six to ten service categories will typically be included in service catalogs. Infrastructure, learning and development, and communication and cooperation are a few examples of service categories.
Service
Service contains an end-to-end IT Service that delivers value to customers and combines people, processes, and technologies to provide desired outcomes. A service category has a number of connected services. The service combines people, processes, and technology to deliver outputs or results that support end-user work activities, business capabilities, or desired objectives. A service category has a number of connected services. Network and connectivity management and database administration are two examples of services that could be included in the area of infrastructure services.
Service Offering
Service Offering includes the precise technologically oriented task or item that was used to provide the services, including software packages or unique application solutions. For a single service, there may be several service options available. These could be software packages, tailored application solutions, or other types of technology that facilitate the provision of a service. For a single service, there may be several service options available. Microsoft 365 and Google Workspace are two examples of services that provide email and collaboration tools.
In most cases, IT organizations, especially in small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), are still very technical and IT-asset-minded (Rudolph et. al. 2009). When it comes to building a customer-centric IT Service Catalog, companies should take into account the customer's behavior and feedback in the market, especially the way they responded to services that are being used.
Business leaders believe customer experience is central to firm competitiveness (McCall, 2015). For this reason, the IT Service Catalogue is used as a common communication basis for the IT and the customers to identify the amount, scope, quality, and price (Ubernickel et. al. 2006; Strum et. al. 2000)
IT services cover the development, customization, and operations of IT applications as well as IT infrastructure. They must correspond to the customers' needs and provide a perceptive customer benefit (Zarnekow et. al. 2006).
Customer Experience Definition
Customer experience is defined by Meyer and Schwager (2007) as 'the subjective and internal responses that customers have in any direct or indirect contact with a company'. (refer to measuring customer experience). Companies must manage the emotional components of experience with the same accuracy as the management of product and service functionality. While customer experience represents the customer-oriented interaction between the companies, brands, products, and services, the services experience dimension has greater breadth in the service sector and is considered a key concept of service-dominant logic and the basis for all business (De Rojas & Camarero, 2018; Grönroos, 2008; Heinonen & Strandvik, 2011)
How IT Service Catalog Can Improve Customer Experience
The customer experience has become the focus of management research because creating meaningful customer experience results in customer satisfaction, which is essential to achieving competitive advantages (McColl-Kennedy et. al., 2015; Mosavi, Sangari, & Keramati, 2018). Below are several steps that can be implemented in improving customer experience using IT Service Catalog.
1. Services are meant to deliver value to customers
When putting IT Service Catalog to markets, IT Service Providers should ensure that each service offered can become a solution for their users. Each service is specified using the IT Service Catalog models to analyze the service flow and targeted outcomes that align with customers' requests. As a service provider, IT focuses on the customer and the services the customer is actually demanding (DuMoulin et. al. 2008).
2. Values should be helpful and meaningful
Values that are delivered should be meaningful and helpful in order to create a pleasant experience for customers. The service offering takes care of a concern, worry, want, requirement, or need (DuMoulin et. al. 2008). For this reason, IT service providers should manage all details and information contained in the IT Service Catalog that covers customers' demands clearly and deliver benefits to the customers.
3. Evaluate outcomes of Customer Experience
IT Providers can collect and analyze outcomes of the IT Service Catalog to ensure its success, in this case, improving positive customer experience. The customer expects a certain benefit, but the provider of the service is focused on activities (DuMoulin et. al. 2008). IT Providers should be able to fill the gap within the condition to align the business process between them and the customers. The benefit of a service offering needs to be articulated clearly, quantified and qualified in a way that both parties can objectively understand what is to be achieved by the service (DuMoulin et. al. 2008).
Conclusion
With a well-developed IT Department and accurate measurement, companies are able to deliver a customer-centric IT Service Catalog with a clear vision and service specifications that could win the market. Utilizing IT Service Catalog, along with its supporting device such as SLAs also can help customers to have a better understanding of what services could meet their requests and gain added values. The development of well-crafted Service Catalogs and Service Level Agreements (SLAs) can define success for IT operations and service delivery in terms of alignment with the needs of the business (DuMoulin et. al. 2008). In this way, a positive customer experience can be achieved effectively.
Reference:
De Rojas, C., & Camarero, C. (2008). Visitors’ experience, mood and satisfaction in a heritage context: Evidence from an interpretation center. Tourism Management, 29(3), 525–537.
Gandar, M. (2006). The Service Catalogue and the CMDB: Front Office and Back Office IT. July pp. 1-11
Meyer, C., & Schwager, A. (2007). Customer experience. Harvard Business Review, 85(2), 116–126
