1. #10: Manage platform demand
Success Pillar: Actively lead the transformation
I initially liked the structure for this, but I began to see a few challenges as I worked through it. Steps 1-3 really stretch out the demand board process – while I agree that defining the intake model is step 1, a lot of what’s between steps 2-3 feels like it could be consolidated. Both of those are about, IMHO, assembling the backlog.
With that in mind, I didn’t see a step re:  managing the backlog. Shouldn’t that be a function? Feels like (a) I have a process that adds to my backlog, but (b) I’m also going to be continuously (or periodically) reviewing and reprioritizing the backlog, especially as business objectives change and/or upgrades deliver new capability. That also leads to another thought – we’re not really as clear as we could be in stating that there should be a high bar for customization (at least it’s not really coming across in the language).
Step 4 misses for me in a few places:
If I want to identify and anticipate future demand, I really need to take a hard look at business (and business line) strategic plans that are going to impact my roadmap over the next year. For example, if my company is going to add 20% headcount next year, I need to account for that impact in terms of, e.g., a user base, demands on employee onboarding, etc. That seems like a step before I go talk to folks.
The Agile section didn’t feel Agile to me – but see embedded notes.

2. Success Pillars – Structure
State and measure your business goals
Actively lead the transformation
Get your ServiceNow foundations right
Create excitement, drive adoption 1
State your transformation vision and outcomes 5
Engage executive sponsor to drive change and remove roadblocks 11
Manage to
“Out-of-the Box” 15
Design an engaging self-service employee & customer experience 2
Build your business case 6
Find, manage, and coordinate capable, certified partners 12
Discover and map your service assets 16
Design an optimal agent and rep experience 3
Build a phased
program plan, identify quick win 7
Build dedicated, dynamic governance process, policies & team 13
Plan your architecture, instances, integrations and data flows 17
Create change management plan 4
Baseline and track performance, usage KPIs and metrics 8
Reimagine how you want work processes to flow 14
Plan for upgrades at least once a year 18
Build internal team of ServiceNow experts & train users 9
Define and map out your business services 19
Build a community of champions 10
Manage platform demand

3. Manage platform demand
Demand management focuses on measuring, predicting and understanding your customer’s usage patterns, anticipating their changing needs, and assessing their demand for products and services. Demand for ServiceNow functionality should be managed in partnership with business stakeholders, as demand is constantly changing based on business conditions, goals, and organizational objectives.
Insight: Managing ServiceNow platform demand
Demand management ensures that the ServiceNow platform team and service delivery function has capacity to meet business partner demand, and is responsive to business partner requirements so that services provided are fit for purpose. Without demand management, the link between business value and service delivery can be lost.
The goals for managing platform demand are:
Visibility – Establish a clear line of sight to all platform requests from the business
Control – Make fact-based decisions about which projects and enhancements the platform team undertakes
Alignment – Group platform projects and enhancements by business objectives
Planning and velocity – Look ahead to predict future demand while becoming more agile in addressing current demands.
SRA Questions:
Manage platform demand
2Q6. Which of the following statements best characterizes your process for managing and prioritizing demands for ServiceNow functionality (including configuration and customization)?
Our process is informal and inconsistent (Go to 2Q8)
Demand for ServiceNow functionality is evaluated and approved based on adherence to technical standards (Go to 2Q8)
Demand for ServiceNow functionality is evaluated, approved, and prioritized based on the value, risk, and cost associated with new requests (Go to 2Q8)
Demand for ServiceNow functionality is evaluated, approved, and prioritized based on value, risk, cost, and alignment to our overall objectives for our ServiceNow implementation (Go to 2Q8)
Key Implementation Steps
Start
Improve
Optimize
1. Create visibility by building a demand intake model
2. Take control by enhancing, prioritizing and approving demands
3. Align approved demands to business outcomes
4. Increase velocity and plan future demand

4. Step 1a: Define demand management roles
Demand management needs to predict demand based on historical usage, influence demand with compelling service offerings, and capture demand for new services, service components, or configuration/customization on the Now Platform.
The three main roles through which demand comes to the ServiceNow team are business liaisons, service owners, and the service desk. Each of these groups needs to know where to go internally to discuss demand and capacity issues.
Establish a demand owner role *
Responsible for shepherding demands from start to finish
Should be a project manager or have a similar background/skillset
Align demand owners with Business Relationship Managers (BRMs) – liaisons between IT and lines of business (LOBs)
Gathers additional information about the request through interviews, surveys and research
Establish a demand board
Establish a ServiceNow Demand Board with monthly meetings to manage and shape demand, and to measure demand management success over time.
Required members: Platform Architect, Platform Owner, Demand Owners
Recommended members: IT Process/Domain Owners, Portfolio/Service Owners, Program Manager, Business Analysts/Business Relationship Managers, Vendor Managers, Key Suppliers & Partners
Identify and train demand requesters
Stand up an initial pilot group of four to six business liaisons, service owners and/or service fulfillers
Develop a curriculum that includes:
An overview of the demand process from request to approval
The information required for a complete request, including definitions and examples of each
Set up monthly enablement calls and/or office hours to address any questions they may have
Track their requests for completeness and accuracy and share feedback regularly
* Number of demand owners and full-time/part-time profile depends on the size and complexity of the organization
Small = 1-2 part-time demand owners
Large = 2-3 full-time demand owners
Steps
1. Create visibility by building a demand intake model
2. Take control by enhancing, prioritizing and approving demands
3. Align approved demands to business outcomes
4. Increase velocity and plan future demand

5. Step 1b: Define demand management intake processes
Once demand management roles are understood, the demand management process needs to be defined, starting with the demand intake process. The Demand Board should ensure that new proposals for ServiceNow functionality, configuration, or customization adhere to explicitly-defined criteria for business value.
The process for vetting incoming demands should include assessing the relative business value of a requirement, the cost of its implementation and support, and its potential technical risks.
Define the information required to include in a proper demand request in ServiceNow
Brief description
Business case
Value to the group requesting / value to the organization as a whole
Executive sponsor. Provides proof of management support of the requesting organization.
Primary user roles this request will benefit
Capture the business value of new demand requests during ideation
Develop simple scoring mechanisms to help demand submitters identify the business value of a new demand requirement while it’s in the ideation phase
Use ServiceNow ITBM Demand Management module as your demand management system of record
If you don’t currently use ServiceNow Demand Management, contact your Account Team for additional information
Ask ServiceNow Professional Services for offline tools to capture demands if you don’t currently have a Demand Management tool
Start with demand requesters creating demand records directly, rather than starting with Ideation from the start
Steps
1. Create visibility by building a demand intake model
2. Take control by enhancing, prioritizing and approving demands
3. Align approved demands to business outcomes
4. Increase velocity and plan future demand

6. 2. Take control by enhancing, prioritizing and approving demands
Step 2a: Assign demand requests and enhance with additional information for evaluation
The demand owner is the quarterback for each demand request, responsible for gathering sufficient information for the Demand Board to make an informed decision. This may include reaching out to the requester, other business partners, or stakeholders on the ServiceNow platform team.
Assign a demand owner to each demand request
Set Demand State to “Submitted” (see below)
Track the progress of the demand request using Demand states
Draft – new demand request in process
Submitted – demand record created; demand owner assigned
Screening – demand owner sends assessments to stakeholders
Qualified – assessments returned and consolidated; demand is ready for evaluation by the demand board
Deferred – demand is retained for consideration at the next Demand Board meeting
Approved – demand will be converted to a new artifact (project, enhancement, defect, change)
Completed – if approved, the demand is converted to the new artifact; if rejected, no further consideration will be given to the demand
Enhance the demand request with additional information
Assign each demand to a portfolio – a collection of demands managed as a group to achieve strategic and operational objectives
Create a list of stakeholders who will be impacted by or have an interest in this request
Document additional information including:
Requirements – business, solution, quality, transition
Decisions – capture key choices that may affect the outcome of the demand
Risks – any uncertain event that can potentially impact the success or outcome of a project
Costs – start with a “T-shirt size” estimate (S,M,L,XL) and then add capital and labor costs when estimated
Steps
1. Create visibility by building a demand intake model
2. Take control by enhancing, prioritizing and approving demands
3. Align approved demands to business outcomes
4. Increase velocity and plan future demand

7. 2. Take control by enhancing, prioritizing and approving demands
Step 2b: Determine demand approval thresholds based on the size of the demand
Demands will come in all shapes and sizes, so you shouldn’t take a “one size fits all” approach to approving demands. Tying up your Demand Board with approving small, tactical projects isn’t an efficient use of their time. Demand owners should have the latitude to make decisions on demands up to a certain size; they will then inform the Demand Board of those decisions.
Determine whether a demand will require a project if approved
Demands needing more than 8 hours of effort should be included in a project, either new or existing, if approved
Demands of less than 8 hours should be created as a Change, if approved
Determine thresholds for demands that require demand owner vs. Demand Board approval
Give demand owners authority to approve small, tactical demands to be more responsive to business requests
Demands requiring less than 8 hours of effort (i.e. those that don’t require creation of a project)
Demands requiring creation of a project, but less than a certain duration (i.e. less than 4 weeks)
Demands that you have to do regardless of size, such as those required prior to an approved upgrade
Escalate demand approval to the Demand Board for more complex demands, such as:
Strategic: For example, those that tie to transformational portfolios and themes
Size/time: Demands requiring a project greater than a fiscal quarter (90 days) or those that span fiscal years
Risk: Demands with high risk due to resource, compressed timeline, complex technical requirements, or other factors
Stakeholders: Demands with stakeholders who span multiple business units (customer)
Steps
1. Create visibility by building a demand intake model
2. Take control by enhancing, prioritizing and approving demands
3. Align approved demands to business outcomes
4. Increase velocity and plan future demand

8. Step 2c: Gather assessments from stakeholders
For demands identified as ‘strategic’, after the demand owner has enhanced the demand request with additional cost, risk, and value information, he or she should obtain additional input from stakeholders on the demand’s risk, business value, and cost through the use of assessments. Assessments allow stakeholders to score questions on a scale of one to ten, in such a way that results can be consolidated to provide a quantitative score for risk and business value. These scores are used by the Demand Board as a factor in the decision-making process.
Gather and consolidate assessments for new demand requests from stakeholders
Send assessments to specific stakeholders who can analyze the demand’s risk (business and technical) and alignment to business value
Set Demand State to “Screening”
Include both a numeric score (1-10) as well as an opportunity to provide comments for each assessment question. At a minimum, an assessment should contain at least one question for risk and one question for business value.
Technical risk assessments should include configuration vs. customization analysis for each Demand
Group questions into two categories: Risk and Business Value Alignment
Risk – Technical (customization vs. configuration, integration), certainty of project requirements, complexity of requirements
Business Value Alignment – alignment with strategic/corporate objectives, increase of efficiencies, elimination of existing tools/solutions
Calculate an average score for each quantitative assessment question and each assessment category
After all assessments have been returned, set Demand State to “Qualified”
Practitioner Insight: A bubble chart works well as a visual assessment tool. Using two complementary scoring metrics to place each demand on the graph, employ a third to show the magnitude of the demand. Customers often use Risk and Value to place the demand on the graph, then use Cost to show the magnitude (size of the bubble).
Steps
1. Create visibility by building a demand intake model
2. Take control by enhancing, prioritizing and approving demands
3. Align approved demands to business outcomes
4. Increase velocity and plan future demand

9. Step 2d: Create a demand resource plan
In addition to understanding risk and business value, the demand owner should also estimate effort (according to “t-shirt size”) and assess the capacity of your organization to put the demand into action. The demand owner should construct a resource plan based on the estimated requirements to create not only more accurate cost estimates, but also to avoid over-committing limited development resources.
Identify roles to create a demand resource plan
Resource manager
Responsible for estimation and allocation of resources to projects and demands
May be a dedicated resource manager, program manager, or lead project manager
Demand owner
Initiates a demand resource plan request
Collaborates with Resource manager to provide details on requirements
Create the demand resource plan
Demand owner creates the demand resource plan by:
Adding the resource group or resource roles and an estimate of hours needed based on requirements. The level of precision needed for this estimate should be based on the complexity of the demand request – more complex requests should have more detailed estimates.
Using demand start date as the resource plan start date
Using a consistent time format for all resource plan allocations (i.e. weekly or monthly)
Using a consistent resource request type (hours or FTE) for all demands
Resource manager reviews the resource plan
Resource manager vets requirements with the Demand owner
If changes to the plan are needed, Resource manager rejects the plan and sends back to the Demand manager for revision
If approved, the Resource manager creates a soft allocation of resources – the hours are requested but are not committed unless the demand is approved and converted to a project, when they become a hard allocation
Soft-allocated resources still impact resource availability
Availability = Capacity – Hard Allocations – Soft Allocations
Practitioner Insight: Capturing resource requirements during the demand evaluation process allows for more accurate planning of future labor needs. This enables IT to respond more quickly and accurately to demand requests in the future.
Steps
1. Create visibility by building a demand intake model
2. Take control by enhancing, prioritizing and approving demands
3. Align approved demands to business outcomes
4. Increase velocity and plan future demand

10. Step 2e: Approve, defer, or reject demand requests
For qualified Demands, the Demand Board should ensure that all proposals for ServiceNow functionality, configuration, or customization adhere to explicitly-defined criteria for business value. The Demand Board should scrutinize any demands requiring customization to ensure a smooth upgrade experience and weigh the customization effort against the demand’s business value.
The demand owner or Demand Board reviews the demand requests
The demand owner or Demand Board may elect to modify the scores of a given demand request; the scores submitted in stakeholder assessments should be a starting point, not considered the final decision
Demand owner or Demand Board evaluates demand on any and all information available, including assessments, enhanced demand information, and resource plans
Determine the disposition of the demand
Use standard statuses from the demand process flow
Deferred – the demand remains a demand and is re-evaluated at the next Demand Board meeting
Approved – the demand will move forward; the Demand Board then creates a new artifact (project, enhancement, defect, change)
Completed – work on the Demand is complete, and is either approved or rejected
Re-evaluate demands that have been deferred from the previous meeting based on evolving business priorities and IT capacity
Steps
1. Create visibility by building a demand intake model
2. Take control by enhancing, prioritizing and approving demands
3. Align approved demands to business outcomes
4. Increase velocity and plan future demand

11. Step 2e: Approve, defer, or reject demand request (continued)
For qualified Demands, the Demand Board should ensure that all proposals for ServiceNow functionality, configuration, or customization adhere to explicitly-defined criteria for business value. The Demand Board should scrutinize any demands requiring customization to ensure a smooth upgrade experience and weigh the customization effort against the demand’s business value.
Create an artifact of the demand
Create a project (Strategic demand type)
Create an enhancement (Strategic demand type in an Agile environment)
Create a defect (Operational demand type in an Agile environment)
Create a change (Operational demand type)
Steps
1. Create visibility by building a demand intake model
2. Take control by enhancing, prioritizing and approving demands
3. Align approved demands to business outcomes
4. Increase velocity and plan future demand

12. 3. Align approved demands to business outcomes
Step 3a: Use business unit strategic plans and KPIs to anticipate demand changes
Business services are used to support business outcomes, with a focus on the right outcome metrics for the right cost. You can get ahead of new demands for services and ServiceNow functionality by understanding business unit strategic plans and key KPIs. Map these to capabilities and your current services and ServiceNow roadmap for effective demand conversations.
Understand the impact that business unit goals will have on demand for services and ServiceNow functionality
Meet quarterly with business unit partners/liaisons to understand new or shifting business unit goals and inform the business of new or upcoming ServiceNow capabilities that may eliminate the need for customization
When discussing a new ServiceNow capability, provide examples of how the new capability can directly support/impact their business function, rather than describing the capability in purely technical terms
Use historical service run rates to predict demand for new ServiceNow functionality
Link new business KPIs to current ServiceNow functionality to assess any gaps
For example, increasing customer wallet share may involve improving the customer data available to call center agents for cross-sale, and making that data usable, which may require more integration between ServiceNow and other critical systems
As an outcome of these discussions, demand owners should proactively create demands that align with the newly-understood business objectives
Practitioner Insight: Demand changes are often opportunities to discuss standardization, consolidation of legacy systems, or new ServiceNow functionality, to take advantage of increased scale. These conversations are easier when pitched around the specific business metrics that need to be hit, rather than technical or functional metrics that don’t mean much to the business.
Steps
1. Create visibility by building a demand intake model
2. Take control by enhancing, prioritizing and approving demands
3. Align approved demands to business outcomes
4. Increase velocity and plan future demand

13. Step 3b: Focus demand conversations on business needs
Demand management should be proactive, not reactive. Service organizations – and the ServiceNow platform team - should reach out to service consumers (business partners) to understand their key business outcomes and propose solutions that encourage them to leverage the platform.
Focus the conversation with business partners around progress towards business outcomes to understand where changes need to be made to the ServiceNow platform and program to ensure value realization, and focus on how employees are consuming services through ServiceNow. This allows for better demand conversations and helps business stakeholders understand the value that customization or change –to a platform or process –will bring.
Use defined business outcomes for enterprise service management or digital transformation to orient demand conversations
Start the conversation by understanding the outcomes that drive their success. Example categories include:
Cost reduction
Improved employee/customer experience
Risk reduction
Accelerated innovation
Document the top 3 business outcomes for the business partner
Identify examples where ServiceNow has helped other business partners achieve similar outcomes
Internally, consult with other business groups who have implemented ServiceNow
Externally, check with the ServiceNow Community, Knowledge presentations, or participate in your local ServiceNow User Group (SNUG)
Schedule a follow-up meeting with the business partner to show where ServiceNow has provided value and propose enhancements to support that business partner’s outcomes
Steps
1. Create visibility by building a demand intake model
2. Take control by enhancing, prioritizing and approving demands
3. Align approved demands to business outcomes
4. Increase velocity and plan future demand

14. Step 4a: Apply Agile practices to increase demand responsiveness
Once an organization has a handle on demand with visibility to all demands, control of the demand review and assessment process, and alignment to business objectives, the Demand Board can “up its game” by borrowing from the Agile playbook to increase the “velocity” of demand management. And all this can be done in ServiceNow.
More than just arriving at demand decisions more quickly, Agile techniques allow demand managers to test for changes in the business climate more often and enable them to tie demand to capacity in a nearly real-time manner.
Schedule demand board intake standups daily
Review new demand requests
Provide updates on demand enhancements
Transform demands into user stories and/or epics
If an approved demand cannot be delivered within a single iteration, create it as an epic
Use the INVEST formula to assess the quality of a user story
Independent (of all others)
Negotiable (not a specific contract for features)
Valuable (or vertical)
Estimable (to a good approximation)
Small (so as to fit within an iteration)
Testable (in principle, even if there isn't a test for it yet)
Steps
1. Create visibility by building a demand intake model
2. Take control by enhancing, prioritizing and approving demands
3. Align approved demands to business outcomes
4. Increase velocity and plan future demand

15. Step 4b: Managing demand in a services-focused organization
As the enterprise service management or transformation journey matures, decisions on service investment within a services-focused organization should be given to the Service Owners, who are best placed to identify how and where to meet customer need. Service Owners have complete control over Run the Business (RtB) costs, while Change the Business (CtB) investments are decided across all services, based on the organization’s strategy and defined value outcomes.
Running IT as a Business means that resources saved by reducing Run costs to can be switched to Build/Change capabilities that otherwise may not get funded.
Shift accountability for service demand management to Service Owners
Modify Service Owner performance bonus goals to include accurate demand management
Create compelling services to influence demand
Incorporate customer incentives into Service offerings to shift demand to more cost-effective options.
Measure success both in both financial and customer satisfaction terms
% reduction in Run the Business costs
NPS scores (or similar) for the service from business stakeholders
Practitioner Insight: Encourage Service Owners to look for opportunities to drive consolidation and reduction in costs, and reinvest savings in change programs aimed at addressing key challenges
Steps
1. Create visibility by building a demand intake model
2. Take control by enhancing, prioritizing and approving demands
3. Align approved demands to business outcomes
4. Increase velocity and plan future demand

16. Manage platform demand
Key Performance Indicators
Essential KPIs
Service utilization / load
Backlog (volume / length) for ServiceNow functionality, configuration, or customization
‘Nice to Have’
Voice of the Customer and Net Promoter Scores for Services
Stakeholder Map
Responsible/Accountable
Chief Information Officer/Senior IT Leadership
Service owner/team
Enterprise Architecture
ServiceNow Platform Owner
Consulted/Informed
Business engagement teams
Business partners (internal & external)
All IT staff (especially help desk)
Vendors

17. Appendix

18. Demand flow diagram
Note: A demand can be entered directly as a DEMAND.
Navigate to DEMAND > DEMANDS > CREATE NEW