Publikováno: 16. 2. 2021
DIGITAL TRANSFORMATION AND BUSINESS SUPPORT
Quality bar moved significantly higher
The 14th year of the itSMF CZ conference has barely passed and the preparation of the 15th year has already started.
The central theme of the last conference was the new version of ITIL4. The lectures, workshops and panel discussions have raised many other questions about the direction in which IT services will develop in the near future and what will be driven by this development. This clearly identified the focus of the upcoming conference.
About the conference
Until the last moment, we optimistically hoped for a standard conference in the pleasant environment of a Prague center. However, corona virus decided for us that the 15th annual conference of itSMF CZ will take place online in the form of two parallel streams on Thursday, January 21, 2021 and Friday, January 22, 2021, always from 9:00 a.m. to 1:00 p.m..
The programme was prepared in cooperation with CACIO, itSMF International and itSMF Slovakia.
The focus of the conference stemmed, as already mentioned, from the findings of the last conference. And under the motto DIGITAL TRANSFORMATION AND BUSINESS SUPPORT, our goal was to bring answers to the following questions:
What will the future of corporate IT look like?
During the first half of 2020, most organisations deployed more ICT innovations than in the previous few years combined. How has it changed, and will it still change IT Service Management (ITSM) and IT Operations?
How to get the right people, put them in the right places and how to keep them?
It is good to constantly remind yourself that behind the success in every business is the great work of great people that you have gained and invested in their professional development. Success in ITSM is closely aligned with the four “people, processes, partners, technology” (in this order).
What changes can be expected in ITSM and IT operations?
Now, more than ever, the opportunity and need (today even the need) to make effective and cost-effective changes through products, services and completely new approaches never ends! This also gives the future of ITSM and IT operations, which can be characterized as fit-for-purpose.
What changes do we expect in the provision and support of services?
There are a huge number of changes in the provision and support of IT services right now. The technologies used, business models, user habits, customer priorities are changing. What could never be done all at once must be what was unimaginable is now self-evident.
How are the demands on IT organizations changing?
IT organisations and service providers need to understand, consider and anticipate business and IT trends in order to stay relevant to their customers.
Conference patronage for 2021
Prof. Ing. Jiří Voříšek, CSc., educator and scientist in the field of SSME (Service Science Management and Engineering), strategic management of information systems, system integration, methodology of is/ICT development and operation and IS/ICT outsourcing.
Vladimír Dzurilla, Dip Mgmt, Director General of the Treasury of the Centre for Shared Services, p.p., Adviser to the Prime Minister for ICT and Digitization, Government Plenipotentiary for IT and Digitization
The main areas of interest are transformation projects in the telecommunications, finance and government sectors.
Conference topic
In this spirit, the theme and programme blocks of the conference are focused. Let’s ask the following questions:
- How does IT help business in the (post) coronavirus era? (remote project management, team/internal cooperation, external teams, cross-regions, …)
- How can IT help in the digital age of business? The main barriers to digital transformation?
- What are the news and trends in IT service management (practical experience – DevOps, COBIT, ITIL, ITSM, SRE)
- What role does Cyber Security play in managing IT services?
Program and speakers
Two main program blocks
- (e.g.: How can IT help in the digital age of entrepreneurship? The main barriers to digital transformation? Enterprise Service Management … etc.)
2. ITSM trends 2021 (e.g.: Knowledge frameworks – news: DevOps, ITIL, Cobit… cybersecurity and service management, Tailor-made IT sales… etc.)
A great success was once again the acquisition of very renowned and respected speakers, who have been involved in the development of ITSM for many years. In addition to the traditional ones – Paul Wilkinson (director and owner of GamingWorks.nl) and Roman Zhuravlev (ITSM Portfolio Development Manager, responsible for the continuous development of ITIL), these were:
- George Westerman – is a world-recognized thought leader on leading transformation and competitive advantage through technological innovation.
- Daniel Breston – actively contributes to the practices of ITSM, SIAM, DevOps, leanIT and IT Leadership. He has more than 40 years of experience in international technology management, consulting and coaching.
- David Cannon – is known for crafting industry best practices for Strategy and IT Operations and uses them extensively to make organizations function more effectively and efficiently. He has led consulting practices in Forrester, Hewlett-Packard and BMC Software.
- Robert S. Falkowitz – Managing Director of Concentric Circle Consulting.
- Aleš Špidla – President of the Czech Institute of Information Security Managers.
- Vladimír Kufner – Senior Process Architect in Corporate Architecture and Process Governance at T-Mobile.
- Rob Akershoek – IT4IT & DevOps Architect at Fruition Partners | Northern & Central Europe.
- Jan Zadák – until recently one of the world’s highest-ranking Czech managers.
- Martin Vitouš – leading expert, consultant and supervisor in the areas of strategic, project, process and personal management, mainly focusing on IT.
General evaluation of the conference
Participants
256 people registered for the conference and an average of 170 participants from different private and public sector entities were continuously connected on both days. A record is available to registered participants.
At the conference, 24 speakers gave 23 expert lectures, and 1 panel discussion took place.
Evaluation
The online way of holding the conference was also signed on the evaluation method, where brief comments prevailed in the MS Teams chat. The completed questionnaires were a smaller number, which cannot be considered as a representative sample of participants, however, here we also gained valuable knowledge.
The chat and questionnaires show the following:
- The content of the conference has all met the expectations of the participants.
- The same goes for evaluation of the organization and technical security of the conference.
- The conference benefited most participants.
- The performance of the speakers was rated as of high quality.
- Panel discussion was rated very highly.
Best rated speakers
According to the participants, these were the following speakers:
In the first group it was: George Westerman, Jan Zadák and Aleš Špidla, in the second it was Lucie Nová, Branislav Jarábek, Luis Ribero, Lukáš Varaja, Miroslav Müller and Rob Akershoek.
Despite the fact that without any experience with the organization or with technical security we had to organize the conference online, we and the participants evaluate the conference as very successful and will use the lessons learned in the preparation of the 16th conference in January 2022.
Presidency of itSMF Czech Republic
Autor:: Jaroslav Rokyta