Cost savings through an efficiently tailored Request Management and Change Request Handling

IT Outages as a Major Cost Factor The information technology (IT) of airports and airlines is usually comprised of a complex architecture of various systems and applications. Due to the great complexity of IT paired with a high number of parties involved – e. g. airlines, airports, providers, handling agents, ground and air traffic control centres, and regulatory authorities – outages caused by IT have an immense impact on operations. Besides the negative effect on customer services, IT outages can result in major financial losses as well. Particularly in times of economic downturn and increasing operational costs worldwide, it is challenging for an airline or airport to compensate the financial losses. The Challenge of Evading Avoidable IT Outages In order to reduce costs caused by IT Outages it is therefore necessary to analyse the genuine causes. Amongst other causes, airlines and airports need to investigate especially into avoidable causes. One of the avoidable causes is unquestionably the implementation of changes at the IT infrastructure in an insufficient, unsecured and uncontrolled way. For the purpose of evading costs originated by avoidable IT Outages, it is essential to optimise the handling of IT-related changes including its planning and implementation. A Tailored Request and Change Request Handling as the Solution A holistic management of IT-related requests and change requests is the key to saving costs in the area of IT. For that reason, an adequate handling is needed in order to plan, prepare, steer and evaluate the implementation of all major or critical changes against the existing IT infrastructure. Consequently, the required management can be divided into two significant parts: Request Management and Change Request Handling. • Request Management is the management of requests which is addressed to the IT department. Typically, a request could be the global rollout of a feature at a certain check in or ground handling application. Therefore, a request can affect up to several different systems. • Change Request Handling is the handling of various changes against the existing IT infrastructure. Each change is affecting one particular application or system. The planning of all changes including the coordination with all parties involved as well as the information of the affected locations worldwide belong to a qualified Change Request Handling. In order to properly see these items out, a structured and proven methodology should be employed as such:
The Request Management and Change Request Handling solution can be tailored depend-ing on the wants and needs of the client. On the one hand a holistic implementation solution can be tailored. If the customer has already a Request Management and Change Request Handling on the other hand, cost savings can be enabled by improving the efficiency of the existing processes. Benefits from an efficient Request Management and Change Request Handling Through improving its Request Management and Change Request Handling, the following benefits will be realised. • Reduced Costs from the avoidance of IT outages • Monitoring of the providers enables cost-orientated steering • Efficient, seamless management processes between the IT department and the providers • Improved image of the airline/ airport from a customer’s point of view • Baseline for future cost saving initiatives Reference After several projects in the area of Request Management and Change Request Handling, one of the largest German airlines is currently employing m2p Consulting in another related project again. In 2008, the Request Management has been integrated into the department of check in applications and systems. m2p has been responsible for the entire development and preparation of the Request Management process including a detailed guide for the daily usage of all parties involved. In addition, the already existing Change Request Handling has been optimised and consolidated with the newly developed Request Management in making one efficient and straightforward process. In the beginning of 2009, the developed process will be implemented including test and training of the users concerning the software to be used and, of course, the new Request Man-agement and Change Request Handling. Karen Dorothee Niemeyer is Business Analyst with m2p Consulting which is a management consultancy headquartered in Frankfurt am Main, Germany, with regional offices in Dubai and New York. By combining our aviation expertise with in-depth process knowledge, we help our clients within the Travel and Transport industries understand the need to identify requirements to improve productivity and increase efficiency. Thereby, our consulting focus lies in the business areas of management consulting, professional services and outsourc-ing/ Integration.