Sostenuto ITSM software acts as catalyst for big bang ITIL adoption

Chessington, 12 January 2011 - Pennine Care NHS Foundation Trust, which provides mental health and specialist drug and alcohol services to a population of almost 1.2 million, has become the 44th Trust to receive National Accreditation, supported by Sunrise’s service management solution Sostenuto.

Pennine Care’s ICT team is responsible for supporting five hospital sites and fifty four clinics spread over 200 square miles.

The Accreditation process requires ICT departments to demonstrate strategic alignment to the business and the right technology tools to achieve their goals. Technical Support Manager Jiten Patel explains that Sostenuto was chosen because other solutions were above budget and didn’t provide the same level of functionality.

“When Sostenuto was demonstrated to us,” he adds, “it just looked the part. It was flexible enough to fit our needs as well as being ITIL compliant out of the box, and it came in within budget. The Sunrise business consultants were outstanding, they sat down with us and listened to our requirements. Then it was a case of:  ‘this is what you want to do’ and ‘this is how you can do it in Sostenuto.”

“Using Sostenuto as a catalyst for change, most elements of ‘what we did’ were reviewed and questioned,” says Jiten. “This led to all IT processes being re-designed in order to reach ITIL standards. What we have now are processes which ensure that ICT Service Delivery is effective and provides value for money.”

As a result, the team has been able to show marked improvements in SLA performance, which has climbed from 86% before the new processes were implemented to 97% today.

“Sostenuto has helped us achieve more transparency across the board, fulfilling one of the key requirements for National Accreditation.” says Jiten. “Performance and SLA management are now core to our operation, we publish our statistics across the business, have achieved improved teamwork within ICT and better communication with Trust employees and third parties.”

The Trust’s IT asset management requirements are complex to say the least. “We make full use of the ‘associations’ functionality within Sostenuto to link up all of our configuration items throughout their lifecycle,” says Jiten.  Thanks to the purchasing functionality within Sostenuto, the team can buy equipment in bulk through the use of the ‘business case’ function. 

Pennine Care ICT Department is not one to be defeated by the current challenging climate in the NHS, on the contrary: “There is no doubt that the main driver in this project was to become an efficient proactive service. The NHS has seen and will see a lot of changes,” Jiten says. “It will be the trusts who prove they have the right capability who will dominate in this process. If you ignore the issues, they will end up catching up with you. It’s far better to tackle them straight away.”