Government Technology

“Despite a global recession, it was immensely pleasing to see healthy numbers of sponsors, exhibitors and delegates engaging and sharing experience and information. It is a huge encouragement to me that in these days of social media and a ‘twitter’ society, our members still value the opportunity we give them to experience a physical world class service management event over virtual alternatives,” said Barry Corless, itSMF UK Chairman.
    
Conference
The Conference this year sponsored by BCS and IBM hosted a large exhibition with over 50 seminar sessions, experiential learning sessions from HP and G2G3 and the IT Service Management Industry Awards. It attracted more than 1100 delegates across the two day event, which took place on the 9-10th November 2009. Delegate Barry Smith, Head of IT at Foster and Partners said: “It’s a chance to come together to share ideas and experiences. It gives me the opportunity to spend some time away from the office, to reflect, refocus and re-prioritise workloads.”
    
Keith Aldis, itSMF UK CEO said. “It was, no doubt the best ever conference with lots of innovative thinking going on at all the sessions, we had Ian Pearson telling us about the future of IT and the inevitable feminisation of the IT Industry as well as a fantastic talk from Sir Clive Woodward. The Awards dinner was fantastic, hosted by TV commentator John Inverdale who added to an already charged atmosphere. As a first, people will be able to access the opening and closing videos from the Conference, enabling you to not only have a glimpse into this year’s story but to also see how the itSMF UK Conference is evolving. Here’s to next year’s!”

The IT Service Management Industry Awards 2009
The Conference also hosts the prestigious IT Service Management Industry Awards. The awards recognise outstanding achievements and significant contribution to the world of IT Service Management, showcasing the people and organisations that are at the forefront of the IT Service Management industry.
    
This year entries doubled that of last years, with a tremendous level of quality, coming from a wide variety of organisations. Keith Aldis, itSMF UK CEO explained: “The current climate we now live in requires all parts of a business to step up, but our industry has a phenomenal opportunity to help companies make the most in challenging times; our award finalists and winners highlight some fantastic innovation, passion and commitment to Service Management, their case studies only endorse this statement.”
    
itSMF UK Chairman, Barry Corless added “Every year I walk away from our awards ceremony thinking we can’t top that next year. I continue to be proved wrong, at what is after all the premier service management focused events evening in the calendar. The winners really do visibly swell with pride as they receive their awards.”  
    
Winners
This year’s awards featured eight categories and the winners are:

Student of the Year: ISO/IEC 20000, awarded to the individual that, in the markings submitted to itSMF UK, has been the most successful highest scoring student during the year, went to Malcolm Ashton, Execit Management Ltd.
    
Student of the Year: ITIL, awarded to the student listed on the Official Accreditor’s ITIL Successful Candidate Register who has achieved the highest average mark across two or more ITIL Intermediate qualifications, went to Tony Williams, NHS Ashton, Leigh and Wigan and Donovan Pearce, Roche Products Limited.
    
The Trainer of the Year award went to Mike O’Brien of Remarc (now part of QA) who, in the view of lead judge Dave Jones, “demonstrated an unparalleled dedication to the betterment of the students in his charge.”
Submission of the Year was awarded to Ian MacDonald of The Cooperative Financial Services, for his paper entitled a simple, low cost but innovative approach to End-To-End Service Reporting. Ian MacDonald said: “Winning the ‘Submission of the Year’ award at the itSMF is the ultimate recognition you can receive as an IT professional for your work and the value it provides to the forum and its membership.”
    
The Service Innovation award went to ‘Systems Thinking’ at Stockport Council. The judges said that: “Utilising service management alongside other methodologies and technologies has often been done but the results are not always as demonstrable as in the case of Systems Thinking.”
    
The Service Management Champion of the Year award went to Terry Hodge of Logica who, according to head judge Tony Price, “demonstrated really excellent service across all his interactions.” Tony commented, “It was very humbling to receive such a prestigious award and to find that both my colleagues and client had collaborated on the bid. I just need to live up to it now.”
    
ITSM Project of the Year was awarded for BT’s Major UK Network Programme’s CSIP Enterprise. Chair of judges Kevin Birch commented that, “This year’s winning submission demonstrated real quality throughout the lifecycle of their project and showed why they were a cut above the other submissions.”
    
Finally, the Paul Rappaport Award for Outstanding ‘Lifetime’ Contribution to Service Management was awarded to Philip ‘Monty’ Montanaro, HP. Monty has been heavily involved with ITSM and ITIL since their earliest days. A key member of the ITIL examination scheme, he has been an examiner and member of accreditation panels for more years than he would care to remember and has contributed to numerous areas of ITSM and itSMF activity. From sitting on the committee that developed the BS 15000 qualification scheme to being a part of the itSMF management board to being a reviewer for ITIL version 2 and a mentor for one of the ITIL version 3 books – Monty continues to contribute a massive amount to our industry as it moves forward.

At a glance
At a glance…the winners are:

• Student of the Year: ISO/IEC 20000 – Malcolm Ashton, Execit Management Ltd
• Student of the Year: ITIL – Tony Williams, NHS Ashton, Leigh and Wigan and Donovan Pearce, Roche Products Limited
• Trainer of the Year – Mike O’Brien, Remarc (now part of QA) Submission of the Year – End-to-End Service Reporting submitted by Ian MacDonald, The Co-operative Financial Services
• Service Innovation – Systems Thinking, Stockport Council
• Service Management Champion – Terry Hodge, Logica
• IT Service Management Project – BT Global Services, Major UK Network Programmes – CSIP Enterprise
• Paul Rappaport Award for Outstanding Contribution to Service Management – Philip Montanaro, HP