Upgrade/Release Best Practice

[Cameron13]

Team,

We are starting our ServiceNow transformation (from legacy platform),  ITSM, ITOM, CSM are scoped for Phaes1.( due to resources concerns we are using phased Approach ). GRC/IRM, Sec Ops , HRSD are scoped for 2nd phase. Mgmt. wants to bring Now platform Live ASAP, considering this our plan is to start first phase in Mar-2022. But concern is, ServiceNow San Diego release is in Apr/May2022. What do you advise, should we wait for SanDiego and than start transformation on San Diego? Mgmt.  want to keep the platform up-to-date with the latest release(max 4 weeks delay). Please share your thoughts on that ? Can we start development in March and upgrade during the development..? is it good practice ?

[Maik Skoddow]

Hi @Cameron 

it really depends on how extensive your customizations are. If you use only OOTB features or custom applications in a custom scope, then upgrading is no problem at any time.

But in case you have customized OOTB artifacts, then waiting for the next family can be an option for you.

Check the upgrade preview (https://docs.servicenow.com/bundle/rome-platform-administration/page/administer/upgrade-center/conce...). It will present to you the predicted skipped records. That way, you can calculate the upgrading efforts and the related risks.

Please also check the upgrade best practices area at ServiceNow's website. There are tons of materials to answer all your questions regarding upgrades: https://www.servicenow.com/success/instance-upgrades/upgrade-best-practices.html

Kind regards
Maik

[Allen Andreas · Accepted solution]

Hi,

I'm unsure the size of your team or if you're using a ServiceNow Partner, but firstly, you'd want to review those options and consider consulting. You've already mentioned "resource concerns", so that's an issue.

While coincidentally...right when management wants to start phase 1, San Diego would be released (late March(ish)). With that said, it's not normally customary that people jump right on the latest release the same day/week it comes out. Some will at least wait until Patch 2 (old school people will say wait until Patch 4, etc.).

You'd want to weigh your options. What is your instance on now? Rome I would imagine. For those pieces you're trying to implement in phase 1 -- do you need or want any San Diego features? All of those may not be available yet to even consider.

With that said, you can't start until you decide on a version.

We can't really help you but so much because we don't know the experience of the team, if you're using a partner, if you have additional resources, etc. This all comes in to play. Is your contract an N-1? N-0?

There's a bit more to it than just the technical piece. It's the manpower and other questions and frankly the forums can't help you but so much. Ideally, these conversations would have already been had with business stakeholders and ServiceNow when this was all paid for.

The safe play would be to go with Rome and the latest patch/hotfix and do both phases in this with the expectation to upgrade later in the year as Tokyo is about to come out (in the Fall). Then, you would rinse and repeat with being on Fall upgrade cycle (unless you need the spring release desperately -- but again, staffing and other questions come into play).

Your management can't necessarily make that statement (I mean I guess they could, but it's not an educated statement). If they're saying max 4 week delay on every new release...good luck. When starting out, if you're following basic guidelines without much customization, then you can start in Rome now, let San Diego come out and give it a couple of weeks, then upgrade. You would need to follow upgrade best practices and keep communication very clear to all people assisting with the project.

Please mark reply as Helpful/Correct, if applicable. Thanks!

[Srinivasa Chall]

Hi Allen,

Great information. We have been following the patch 4 rule for a while now and are thinking of adopting future releases sooner. Do you think it is fairly safe to upgrade to a patch 2 release?

[Allen Andreas]

Hi,

Great question and very appropriate.

From my experience with ServiceNow upgrades and how they've progressed over the years, they are of higher quality, to say it bluntly. Not that they weren't necessarily quality before, but ServiceNow captures more feedback even prior to early access. Then capture more during early access, etc. Now, we are going with a "Patch 1" release adoption process. Normally 30 days after the release is generally available, is the sweet spot I would recommend. So, if you all have a patch 2 release adoption process then you're even "better off" as far as waiting, but...just to throw it out there, 30 days post release would be safe as well. Just my 2 cents.