Demand Management: Strategic vs Operational

Randy Borges · ‎03-15-2021

Hi @Namita Mishra,

We have been using ServiceNow Demand and Portfolio Management and are interested in understanding how other institutions are using the two categories within Demands.

Currently you have two options. Strategic and Operational. I have found in testing that you are not able to create projects from Operational Demands which leads me to one of my questions.

What is the purpose using the Operational category? Is it to actually perform the work within the Demand? Who is managing that demand?

Lastly, once demands is created, it automatically populates as Strategic and those are the only ones that allow for the creation of a project. I have done a lot of research on this and this forum appears to be the place that may have the answers. Looking for clarification from anyone who can help shed some light on this topic.

Thanks,

Randy Borges

Jon Miller1 · ‎03-16-2021

I don't like this part of the ServiceNow design, Randy. It precludes the ability to work on a project that is operational in nature. In the real world, a "project" is a mechanism for getting work done. It is not exclusively for "strategic" work. We actually found the two "Operational" types (Change and Defect) were actually causing confusion. We had a lot of departments that insisted they had to enter Demand of type Change for a CR resulting from a project! We ended up disabling "Operational" (i.e. a user can only select category "Strategic") and have, therefore, limited demand to type "Project" and type "Enhancement". We tend not to put "break-fix" through demand management anyway so type "defect" was a little redundant. We never found a sufficient use-case to support type "change". Why go through demand management just for a server reboot?!

I could live with "defect" and "change" for the occasional exception. But what would make sense is to support Strategic-Project and Operational-Project.

Jon

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Rae Ann Prasnic · ‎03-15-2021

The value in the category field determines the values available in the type field. And the type field determines what record type you can promote the demand to.

If the demand is something that will support "keeping the lights on" - it is considered operational. If you select the category of operational you will only be able to promote the demand to a change or defect.
If the demand is an effort working toward a strategic goal of the organization - it is strategic. If you select the category of strategic you will only be able to promote the demand to an enhancement, project, epic or story.

You are correct in that OOTB your demand must be strategic in order to create a project. It is assumed if the effort isn't strategic it shouldn't require a large effort and therefore you can create a change or defect.

Please let me know if this is helpful and/or answers your question correctly. Rae Ann

Randy Borges · ‎03-16-2021

Thank you! I really appreciate the explanation, as I have been interpreting the Operational Demand as KTLO type of work, that does necessarily fit a Request.

Gerald Fuchs · ‎10-29-2021

@Rae Ann Prasnicki, I do find this approach quite strange. When coming from an Idea, which has very specific information, the next step is in the Demand Process to make a decision if this is an Strategic demand or a Operational Demand.
What are the criteria to make this decision? How is the decision making process guided in ServiceNow? I feel there is a gap here.

Rae Ann Prasnic · ‎11-02-2021

ServiceNow does not outline "the decision making process" for...really anything. They leave that up to each organization.

Maybe think of the Category/Type fields as a mechanism for creating different records...say project versus change...instead of whether the demand is strategic or operational. That is really the purpose of those two fields - to trigger what records is generated from the Demand. Your organization can determine what questions you are asking to make that conversion decision.

Hopefully, that helps. Rae Ann