I met a few interesting people during my recent travel to Europe. I could not stop myself relating them and fitting them in the ideal IT services world.

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We had a GUIDE handling us (group of 30 folks I guess) so efficiently. We were different languages, different accents, bombarding him at times with questions, and also expecting him to really address our queries. He did not lose his cool at once. He smiled, answered, repeated, and still managed to keep us moving ‘happily’. Is not that what a good Service Desk looks like which is not tired of tickets and is just fluent in patience?

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During the check in at the hotel we had this RECEPTIONIST. My booking had a mix up. She owned the issue, coordinated internally, and resolved it. She was on it immediately and fixed a booking error without excuses. Just quiet ownership and quick action. That exactly I would say is Incident Management at its best. We solve before we explain.

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I had this COFFEE ORDER TAKER at one of the known and popular coffee chain outlets. We were a long queue and noisy! He also had struggles noting down the names of the orderers as he had global customers with different types of names and pronunciations! However, he did not miss a beat. He managed this chaos with handling one order at a time. There was no panic, no confusion, getting clarity wherever needed (e.g. how to spell your name?). Yet every order was right, every name called correctly, and yes, every smile intact. Isn’t this a smooth operation. In fact, an operations excellence.

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None of them would have ever heard the term ITIL. But all of them had what IT often misses – the heart for service. Sometimes, you just need people who care about your issue and fix it. That is the true value as a consumer of services (IT services included but of course).

You can automate systems. You cannot automate customer centricity.