You have a mandate to create an accurate and actionable database of the IT assets in your environment, but:
- The data you have is often incomplete or wrong.
- Processes are broken or non-existent.
- Your tools aren’t up to the task of tracking ever more hardware, software, and relevant metadata.
- The role of stakeholders outside the core ITAM team isn’t well defined or understood.
Our Advice
Critical Insight
ITAM is a foundational IT service that provides accurate, accessible, actionable data on IT assets. But there’s no value in data for data’s sake. Enable collaboration between IT asset managers, business leaders, and IT leaders to develop an ITAM strategy that maximizes the value they can deliver as service providers.
Impact and Result
- Develop an approach and strategy for ITAM that is sustainable and aligned with your business priorities.
- Clarify the structure for the ITAM program, including scope, responsibility and accountability, centralization vs. decentralization, outsourcing vs. insourcing, and more.
- Create a practical roadmap to guide improvement.
- Summarize your strategy and approach using Info-Tech’s templates for review with stakeholders.
Member Testimonials
After each Info-Tech experience, we ask our members to quantify the real-time savings, monetary impact, and project improvements our research helped them achieve. See our top member experiences for this blueprint and what our clients have to say.
8.7/10
Overall Impact
$60,132
Average $ Saved
34
Average Days Saved
Client
Experience
Impact
$ Saved
Days Saved
Virginia Department of Health
Workshop
10/10
$75,599
60
Department of Energy and Public Works
Guided Implementation
9/10
$41,799
23
Coherus Biosciences
Guided Implementation
7/10
$62,999
20
Workshop: Develop an IT Asset Management Strategy
Workshops offer an easy way to accelerate your project. If you are unable to do the project yourself, and a Guided Implementation isn't enough, we offer low-cost delivery of our project workshops. We take you through every phase of your project and ensure that you have a roadmap in place to complete your project successfully.
Module 1: Identify ITAM Priorities & Goals, Maturity, Metrics and KPIs
The Purpose
- Align key stakeholders to the potential strategic value of the IT asset management practice.
- Ensure the ITAM practice is focused on business-aligned goals.
Key Benefits Achieved
- Define a business-aligned direction and expected outcomes for your ITAM program.
Activities
Outputs
Brainstorm ITAM opportunities and challenges.
- ITAM opportunities and challenges
Conduct an executive alignment working session.
- Align executive priorities with ITAM opportunities.
Set ITAM priorities, goals and tactics.
- ITAM metrics and KPIs
Identify target and current state ITAM maturity.
- ITAM maturity
Module 2: Identify Your Approach to Support ITAM Priorities and Goals
The Purpose
- Translate goals into specific and coherent actions to enable your ITAM practice to deliver business value.
Key Benefits Achieved
- A business-aligned approach to ITAM, encompassing scope, structure, tools, audits, budgets, documentation and more.
- A high-level roadmap to achieve your vision for the ITAM practice.
Activities
Outputs
Define ITAM scope.
Acquire ITAM services (outsourcing and contracting).
Centralize or decentralize ITAM capabilities.
Create a RACI for the ITAM practice.
Align ITAM with other service management practices.
Evaluate ITAM tools and integrations.
Create a plan for internal and external audits.
Improve your budget processes.
Establish a documentation framework.
- Your ITAM approach
Create a roadmap and communication plan.
- ITAM roadmap and communication plan
Develop an IT Asset Management Strategy
Define your business-aligned approach to ITAM.
Table of Contents
17 Phase 1: Establish Business-Aligned ITAM Goals and Priorities
59 Phase 2: Support ITAM Goals and Priorities
116 Bibliography
Develop an IT Asset Management Strategy
Define your business-aligned approach to ITAM.
EXECUTIVE BRIEF
Analyst Perspective
Track hardware and software. Seems easy, right?
It’s often taken for granted that IT can easily and accurately provide definitive answers to questions like “how many laptops do we have at Site 1?” or “do we have the right number of SQL licenses?” or “how much do we need to budget for device replacements next year?” After all, don’t we know what we have? IT can’t easily provide these answers because to do so you must track hardware and software throughout its lifecycle – which is not easy. And unfortunately, you often need to respond to these questions on very short notice because of an audit or to support a budgeting exercise. IT Asset Management (ITAM) is the solution. It’s not a new solution – the discipline has been around for decades. But the key to success is to deploy the practice in a way that is sustainable, right-sized, and maximizes value. Use our practical methodology to develop and document your approach to ITAM that is aligned with the goals of your organization.
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Realize the value of asset management
Cost optimization, application rationalization and reduction of technical debt are all considered valuable to right-size spending and improve service outcomes. Without access to accurate data, these activities require significant investments of time and effort, starting with creation of point-in-time inventories, which lengthens the timeline to reaching project value and may still not be accurate. Cost optimization and reduction of technical debt should be part of your culture and technical roadmap rather than one-off projects. Why? Access to accurate information enables the organization to quickly make decisions and pivot plans as needed. Through asset management, ongoing harvest and redeployment of assets improves utilization-to-spend ratios. We would never see any organization saying, “We’ve closed our year end books, let’s fire the accountants,” but often see this valuable service relegated to the back burner. Similar to the philosophy that “the best time to plant a tree is 20 years ago and the next best time is now,” the sooner you can start to collect, validate, and analyze data, the sooner you will find value in it.
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Executive Summary
Your Challenge
You have a mandate to create an accurate and actionable database of the IT assets in your environment, but:
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Common Obstacles
It is challenging to make needed changes because:
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Info-Tech’s Approach
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Info-Tech Insight
ITAM is a foundational IT service that provides accurate, accessible, actionable data on IT assets. But there’s no value in data for data’s sake. Enable collaboration between IT asset managers, business leaders, and IT leaders to develop an ITAM strategy that maximizes the value they can deliver as service providers.
Unlock business value with IT asset management
This blueprint will help you develop your approach for the management of IT hardware and software, including cloud services. Leverage other Info-Tech methodologies to dive directly into developing hardware asset management procedures, software asset management procedures, or to implement configuration management best practices. |
Info-Tech Members report significant savings from implementing our hardware and software asset management frameworks. In order to maximize value from the process-focused methodologies below, develop your ITAM strategy first. Implement Hardware Asset Management (Based on Info-Tech Measured Value Surveys results from clients working through these blueprints, as of February 2022.)
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ITAM provides both early and ongoing valueITAM isn’t one-and-done. Properly supported, your ITAM practice will deliver up-front value that will help demonstrate the value ongoing ITAM can offer through the maintenance of an accurate, accessible, and actionable ITAM database. |
Example: Software Savings from ITAM![]() This chart shows the money saved between the first quote and the final price for software and maintenance by a five-person ITAM team. Over a year and a half, they saved their organization a total of $7.5 million from a first quote total of $21 million over that period. This is a perfect example of the direct value that ITAM can provide on an ongoing basis to the organization, when properly supported and integrated with IT and the business. |
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Examples of up-front value delivered in the first year of the ITAM practice:
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Examples of long-term value from ongoing governance, management, and operational ITAM activities:
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Common obstacles
The rulebook is available, but hard to follow
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ITAM is a mature discipline with well-established standards, certifications, and tools, but we still struggle with it.
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Info-Tech's IT Asset Management Framework (ITAM)
Adopt, manage, and mature activities to enable business value thorugh actionable, accessible, and accurate ITAM data
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Enable Business Value | ![]() |
Business-Aligned Spend
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Facilitate IT Services
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Context-Aware Risk Management
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Plan & GovernBusiness Goals, Risks, and Structure
Ongoing Management Commitment
Culture
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Build & ManageTools & Data
Process
People, Policies, and Providers
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Info-Tech Insight
ITAM is a foundational IT service that provides actionable, accessible, and accurate data on IT assets. But there's no value in data for data's sake. Use this methodology to enable collaboration between ITAM, the business, and IT to develop an approach to ITAM that maximizes the value the ITAM team can deliver as service providers.
Key deliverable
IT asset management requires ongoing practice – you can’t just implement it and walk away.
Our methodology will help you build a business-aligned strategy and approach for your ITAM practice with the following outputs:
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Each step of this blueprint is designed to help you create your IT asset management strategy:
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Info-Tech’s methodology to develop an IT asset management strategy
1. Establish business-aligned ITAM goals and priorities | 2. Identify your approach to support ITAM priorities and goals | |
Phase Steps |
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Phase Outcomes | Defined, business-aligned goals and priorities for ITAM. | Establish an approach to achieving ITAM goals and priorities including scope, structure, tools, service management integrations, documentation, and more. |
Project Outcomes | Develop an approach and strategy for ITAM that is sustainable and aligned with your business priorities. |
Insight Summary
There’s no value in data for data’s sake
ITAM is a foundational IT service that provides accurate, accessible, actionable data on IT assets. Enable collaboration between IT asset managers, business leaders, and IT leaders to develop an approach to ITAM that maximizes the value they can deliver as service providers.
Service provider to a service provider
ITAM is often viewed (when it’s viewed at all) as a low-value administrative task that doesn’t directly drive business value. This can make it challenging to build a case for funding and resources.
Your ITAM strategy is a critical component to help you define how ITAM can best deliver value to your organization, and to stop creating data for the sake of data or just to fight the next fire.
Collaboration over order-taking
To align ITAM practices to deliver organizational value, you need a very clear understanding of the organization’s goals – both in the moment and as they change over time.
Ensure your ITAM team has clear line of sight to business strategy, objectives, and decision-makers, so you can continue to deliver value as priorities change
Embrace dotted lines
ITAM teams rely heavily on staff, systems, and data beyond their direct area of control. Identify how you will influence key stakeholders, including technicians, administrators, and business partners.
Help them understand how ITAM success relies on their support, and highlight how their contributions have created organizational value to encourage ongoing support.
Project benefits
Benefits for IT
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Benefits for the business
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Info-Tech offers various levels of support to best suit your needs
DIY Toolkit |
Guided Implementation |
Workshop |
Consulting |
"Our team has already made this critical project a priority, and we have the time and capability, but some guidance along the way would be helpful." | "Our team knows that we need to fix a process, but we need assistance to determine where to focus. Some check-ins along the way would help keep us on track." | "We need to hit the ground running and get this project kicked off immediately. Our team has the ability to take this over once we get a framework and strategy in place." | "Our team does not have the time or the knowledge to take this project on. We need assistance through the entirety of this project." |
Diagnostics and consistent frameworks used throughout all four options |
Guided Implementation
A Guided Implementation (GI) is a series of calls with an Info-Tech analyst to help implement our best practices in your organization.
A typical GI around 12 calls over the course of 6 months.
What does a typical GI on this topic look like?
Call #1: Scope requirements, objectives, and your specific challenges.
Call #2: Review business priorities. Call #3: Identify ITAM goals & target maturity. |
Call #4: Identify metrics and KPIs. | Call #5: Define ITAM scope.
Call #6: Acquire ITAM services. |
Call #7: ITAM structure and RACI.
Call #8: ITAM and service management. Tools and integrations. |
Call #10: Internal and external audits.
Call #11: Budgets & documentation Call #12: Roadmap, comms plan. Wrap-up. |
Phase 1 | Phase 2 |
Workshop Overview |
Contact your account representative for more information.
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Day 1 | Day 2 | Day 3 | Day 4 | Day 5 | |
Identify ITAM priorities & goals, maturity, metrics and KPIs |
Identify your approach to support ITAM priorities and goals |
Next Steps and wrap-Up (offsite) |
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Activities |
1.1 Define ITAM. 1.2 Brainstorm ITAM opportunities and challenges. Conduct an executive alignment working session: 1.3 Review organizational priorities, strategy, and key initiatives. 1.4 Align executive priorities with ITAM opportunities. 1.5 Set ITAM priorities. |
2.1 Translate opportunities into ITAM goals and tactics. 2.2 Identify target and current state ITAM maturity. 2.3 Create mission and vision statements. 2.4 Identify key ITAM metrics and KPIs. |
3.1 Define ITAM scope. 3.2 Acquire ITAM services (outsourcing and contracting) 3.3 Centralize or decentralize ITAM capabilities. 3.4 Create a RACI for the ITAM practice. 3.5 Align ITAM with other service management practices. 3.6 Evaluate ITAM tools and integrations. |
4.1 Create a plan for internal and external audits. 4.2 Improve your budget processes. 4.3 Establish a documentation framework and identify documentation gaps. 4.4 Create a roadmap and communication plan. |
5.1 Complete in-progress deliverables from previous four days. 5.2 Set up review time for workshop deliverables and to discuss next steps. |
Deliverables |
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Phase 1:Establish business-aligned ITAM goals and priorities |
Phase 11.1 Define ITAM and brainstorm opportunities and challenges. Executive Alignment Working Session: 1.2 Review organizational priorities, strategy, and key initiatives. 1.3 Align executive priorities with ITAM opportunities & priorities. 1.4 Identify business-aligned ITAM goals and target maturity. 1.5 Write mission and vision statements. 1.6 Define ITAM metrics and KPIs. |
Phase 22.1 Define ITAM scope. 2.2 Acquire ITAM services (outsourcing and contracting). 2.3 Centralize or decentralize ITAM capabilities. 2.4 Create a RACI for the ITAM practice. 2.5 Align ITAM with other service management practices. 2.6 Evaluate ITAM tools and integrations. 2.7 Create a plan for internal and external audits. 2.8 Improve your budget processes. 2.9 Establish a documentation framework. 2.10 Create a roadmap and communication plan. |
Phase Outcomes:
Defined, business-aligned goals, priorities, and KPIs for ITAM. A concise vision and mission statement. The direction you need to establish a practical, right-sized, effective approach to ITAM for your organization.
Before you get started
Set yourself up for success with these three steps:
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1. Identify participantsReview recommended roles and identify who should participate in the development of your ITAM strategy. |
2. Estimate assets managed todayWork through an initial assessment to establish ease of access to ITAM data and your level of trust in the data available to you. |
3. Create a working folderCreate a repository to house your notes and any work in progress, including your copy of the ITAM Strategy Template. |
0.1 Identify participants
30 minutesOutput: List of key roles for the strategy exercises outlined in this methodology
Participants: Project sponsor, Lead facilitator, ITAM manager and SMEs
This methodology relies on having the right stakeholders in the room to identify ITAM goals, challenges, roles, structure, and more. On each activity slide in this deck, you’ll see an outline of the recommended participants. Use the table below to translate the recommended roles into specific people in your organization. Note that some people may fill multiple roles.
Role | Expectations | People |
Project Sponsor | Accountable for the overall success of the methodology. Ideally, participates in all exercises in this methodology. May be the asset manager or whoever they report to. | Jake Long |
Lead Facilitator | Leads, schedules, and manages all working sessions. Guides discussions and ensures activity outputs are completed. Owns and understands the methodology. Has a working knowledge of ITAM. | Robert Loblaw |
Asset Manager(s) | SME for the ITAM practice. Provides strategic direction to mature ITAM practices in line with organizational goals. Supports the facilitator. | Eve Maldonado |
ITAM Team | Hands-on ITAM professionals and SMEs. Includes the asset manager. Provide input on tactical ITAM opportunities and challenges. | Bruce Wayne, Clark Kent |
IT Leaders & Managers | Leaders of key stakeholder groups from across the IT department – the CIO and direct reports. Provide input on what IT needs from ITAM, and the role their teams should play in ITAM activities. May include delegates, particularly those familiar with day-to-day processes relevant to a particular discussion or exercise. | Marcelina Hardy, Edmund Broughton |
ITAM Business Partners | Non-IT business stakeholders for ITAM. This could include procurement, vendor management, accounting, and others. | Zhang Jin, Effie Lamont |
Business Executives | Organizational leaders and executives (CFO, COO, CEO, and others) or their delegates. Will participate in a mini-workshop to identify organizational goals and initiatives that can present opportunities for the ITAM practice. | Jermaine Mandar, Miranda Kosuth |
0.2 Estimate asset numbers
1 hourOutput: Estimates of quantity and spend related to IT assets, Confidence/margin of error on estimates
Participants: IT asset manager, ITAM team
What do you know about your current IT environment, and how confident are you in that knowledge?
This exercise will help you evaluate the size of the challenge ahead in terms of the raw number of assets in your environment, the spend on those assets, and the level of trust your organization has in the ITAM data.
It is also a baseline snapshot your ability to relay key ITAM metrics quickly and confidently, so you can measure progress (in terms of greater confidence) over time.
Download the IT Asset Estimation Tracker |
“Any time there is doubt about the data and it doesn’t get explained or fixed, then a new spreadsheet is born. Data validation and maintenance is critical to avoid the hidden costs of having bad data” Allison Kinnaird,
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0.3 Create a working folder
15 minutesOutput: A repository for templates and work in progress
Participants: Lead facilitator
Create a central repository for collaboration – it seems like an obvious step, but it’s one that gets forgotten about
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Collect action items as you go
Don’t wait until the end to write down your good ideas.
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Step 1.1: Brainstorm ITAM opportunities and challenges
Participants
- Project sponsor and lead facilitator
- ITAM team
- IT leaders and managers
- ITAM business partners
Outcomes
- Rally the working group around a collection of ideas that, when taken together, create a vision for the future ITAM practice.
- Identify your organization’s current ITAM challenges.
“ITAM is a cultural shift more than a technology shift.” (Rory Canavan, SAM Charter)
What is an IT Asset?
Any piece of technology can be considered an asset, but it doesn’t mean you need to track everything. | ![]() |
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According to the ISO 19770 standard on ITAM, an IT Asset is “[an] item, thing, or entity that can be used to acquire, process, store and distribute digital information and has potential or actual value to an organization.”
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IT assets are distinct from capital assets. Some IT assets will also be capital assets, but not all will be. And not all capital assets are IT assets, either. |
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IT assets are typically tracked by IT, not by finance or accounting.
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It’s important to track IT assets in a way that enables IT to deliver value to the business – and an important part of this is understanding what not to track. This list should be aligned to the needs of your organization. |
What is IT asset management?
What IT Asset Management is NOT:Configuration Management: Configuration management databases (CMDBs) often draw from the same data pool as ITAM (many configuration items are assets, and vice versa), but they focus on the interaction, interconnection, and interoperation of configuration items within the IT estate. In practice, many configuration items will be IT assets (or parts of assets) and vice versa. Configuration and asset teams should work closely together as they develop different but complementary views of the IT environment. Use Info-Tech’s methodology to harness configuration management superpowers. Organizational Data Management: Leverage a different Info-Tech methodology to develop a digital and data asset management program within Info-Tech’s DAM framework. |
“Asset management’s job is not to save the organization money, it’s not to push back on software audits. It’s to keep the asset database as up-to-date and as trustworthy as possible. That’s it.” (Jeremy Boerger, Consultant & Author) “You can’t make any real decisions on CMDB data that’s only 60% accurate. You start extrapolating that out, you’re going to get into big problems.” (Mike Austin, Founder & CEO, MetrixData 360) |
What is an ITAM strategy?Our strategy document will outline a coherent, sustainable, business-aligned approach to ITAM.No single approach to ITAM fits all organizations. Nor will the same approach fit the same organization at different times. A world-leading research university, a state government, and a global manufacturer all have very different goals and priorities that will be best supported by different approaches to ITAM. This methodology will walk you through these critical decisions that will define your approach to ITAM:
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“A good strategy has coherence, coordinating actions, policies, and resources so as to accomplish an important end. Most organizations, most of the time, don’t have this. Instead, they have multiple goals and initiatives that symbolize progress, but no coherent approach to accomplish that progress other than ‘spend more and try harder.’” (Good Strategy, Bad Strategy, Richard Rumelt) |
Enable business value with IT asset management
If you’ve never experienced a mature ITAM program before, it is almost certainly more rewarding than you’d expect once it’s functioning as intended.
Each of the below activities can benefit from accessible, actionable, and accurate ITAM data.
- Which of the activities, practices, and initiatives below have value to your organization?
- Which could benefit most from ITAM data?
Manage Risk: Effective ITAM practices provide data and processes that help mitigate the likelihood and impact of potentially damaging IT risks.
ITAM supports the following practices that help manage organizational risk:
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Optimize Spend: Asset data is essential to maintaining oversight of IT spend, ensuring that scarce resources are allocated where they can have the most impact.
ITAM supports these activities that help optimize spend:
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Improve IT Services: Asset data can help inform solutions development and can be used by service teams to enhance and improve IT service practices.
Use ITAM to facilitate these IT services and initiatives:
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1.1 Brainstorm ideas to create a vision for the ITAM practice
30 minutesInput: Stakeholders with a vision of what ITAM could provide, if resourced and funded adequately
Output: A collection of ideas that, when taken together, create a vision for the future ITAM practice
Materials: ITAM strategy template, Whiteboard or virtual whiteboard
Participants: ITAM team, IT leaders and managers, ITAM business partners
It can be easy to lose sight of long-term goals when you’re stuck in firefighting mode. Let’s get the working group into a forward-looking mindset with this exercise.
Think about what ITAM could deliver with unlimited time, money, and technology.
- Provide three sticky notes to each participant.
- Add the headings to a whiteboard, or use a blank slide as a digital whiteboard
- On each sticky note, ask participants to outline a single idea as follows:
- We could: [idea]
- Which would help: [stakeholder]
- Because: [outcome]
- Ask participants to present their sticky notes and post them to the whiteboard. Ask later participants to group similar ideas together.
As you hear your peers describe what they hope and expect to achieve with ITAM, a shared vision of what ITAM could be will start to emerge.
1.1 Identify structural ITAM challenges
30 minutes
Input: The list of common challenges on the next slide, Your estimated visibility into IT assets from the previous exercise, The experience and knowledge of your participants
Output: Identify current ITAM challenges
Materials: Your working copy of the ITAM Strategy Template
Participants: ITAM team, IT leaders and managers, ITAM business partners
What’s standing in the way today of delivering the ITAM practices you want to achieve?
Review the list of common challenges on the next slide as a group.
Add your results to your copy of the ITAM Strategy Template |
“The problem – the reason why asset management initiatives keep falling on their face – is that people attack asset management as a problem to solve, instead of a practice and epistemological construct.” (Jeremy Boerger, Consultant & Author) |
1.1 Identify structural ITAM challenges
Review and update the list of common challenges below to reflect your own organization.
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What Else? |
Copy results to your copy of the ITAM Strategy Template
Step 1.2: Review organizational priorities, strategy, initiatives
Participants
- Project sponsor and lead facilitator
- ITAM team
- IT leaders and managers
- Business executives or their delegates
Outcomes
- Review organizational priorities and strategy.
- Identify key initiatives.
Enter the executivesDeliver on leadership priorities
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“What outcomes does the organization want from IT asset management? Often, senior managers have a clear vision for the organization and where IT needs to go, and the struggle is to communicate that down.” (Kylie Fowler, ITAM Intelligence) ![]() |
Executive Alignment Session Overview
ITAM Strategy Working Sessions
- Discover & Brainstorm
- Executive Alignment Working Session
- 1.2 Review organizational strategy, priorities, and key initiatives
- 1.3 Align executive priorities with ITAM opportunities, set ITAM priorities
- ITAM Practice Maturity, Vision & Mission, Metrics & KPIs
- Scope, Outsourcing, (De)Centralization, RACI
- Service Management Integration
- ITAM Tools
- Audits, Budgets, Documents
- Roadmap & Comms Plan
A note to the lead facilitator and project sponsor:
Consider working through these exercises by yourself ahead of time. As you do so, you’ll develop your own ideas about where these discussions may go, which will help you guide the discussion and provide examples to participants.
1.2 Review organizational strategy and priorities
30 minutesInput: Organizational strategy documents
Output: A list of prioritized organizational goals, An initial assessment of how ITAM can support these goals
Materials: The diagram in the next slide, and/or a whiteboard, Your copy of the ITAM Strategy Template
Participants: Asset manager, IT leadership, Business executives or delegates
Welcome your group to the working session and outline the next few exercises using the previous slide.
Ask the most senior leader present to provide a summary of the following:
- What is the vision for the organization?
- What are our priorities and what must we absolutely get right?
- What do we expect the organization to look like in three years?
The facilitator or a dedicated note-taker should record key points on a whiteboard or flipchart paper.
1.2 Identify transformational initiatives
30 minutes
Input: Organizational strategy documents
Output: A list of prioritized organizational goals, An initial assessment of how ITAM can support these goals
Materials: The diagram in the next slide, and/or a whiteboard, Your copy of the ITAM Strategy Template
Participants: Asset manager, IT leadership, Business executives or delegates
Ask the most senior leader present to provide a summary of the following: What transformative business and IT initiatives are planned? When will they begin and end?
Using one box per initiative, draw the initiatives in a timeline like the one below.
Add your results to your copy of the ITAM Strategy Template
Step 1.3: Set business-aligned ITAM priorities
Participants
- Project sponsor and lead facilitator
- ITAM team
- IT leaders and managers
- Business executives
Outcomes
- Connect executive priorities to ITAM opportunities.
- Set business-aligned priorities for the ITAM practice.
1.3 Align executive priorities with ITAM opportunities
45 minutes
Input: Organizational strategy documents
Output: A list of prioritized organizational goals, An initial assessment of how ITAM can support these goals
Materials: The diagram in the next slide, and/or a whiteboard, Your copy of the ITAM Strategy Template
Participants: Asset manager, IT leaders and managers, Business executives or delegates
In this exercise, we’ll use the table on the next slide to identify the top priorities of key business and IT stakeholders and connect them to opportunities for the ITAM practice.
- Ask your leadership or executive delegates – what are their goals? What are they trying to accomplish? List roles and related goals in the table.
- Brainstorm opportunities for IT asset management to support listed goals:
- Can ITAM provide an enhanced level of service, access, or insight?
- Can ITAM address an existing issue or mitigate an existing risk?
Add your results to your copy of the ITAM Strategy Template
1.3 Align executive priorities with ITAM opportunities (example)
ITAM is for the… | Who wants to… | Which presents these ITAM opportunities |
CEO | Deliver transformative business initiatives | Acquire the right tech at the right time to support transformational initiatives. |
Establish a data-driven culture of stewardship | Improve data to increase IT spend transparency. | |
COO | Improve organizational efficiency | Increase asset use.
Consolidate major software contracts to drive discounts. |
CFO | Accurately forecast spending | Track and anticipate IT asset spending. |
Control spending | Improve data to increase IT spend transparency.
Consolidate major software contracts to drive discounts. |
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CIO | Demonstrate IT value | Use data to tell a story about value delivered by IT assets. |
Govern IT use | Improve data to increase IT spend transparency. | |
CISO | Manage IT security and compliance risks | Identify abandoned or out-of-spec IT assets.
Provide IT asset data to support controls development. |
Respond to security incidents | Support security incident teams with IT asset data. | |
Apps Leader | Build, integrate, and support applications | Identify opportunities to retire applications with redundant functionality.
Connect applications to relevant licensing and support agreements. |
IT Infra Leader | Build and support IT infrastructure. | Provide input on opportunities to standardize hardware and software.
Provide IT asset data to technicians supporting end users. |
1.3 Categorize ITAM opportunities
10-15 minutes
Input: The outputs from the previous exercise
Output: Executive priorities, sorted into the three categories at the right
Materials: The table in this slide, The outputs from the previous exercise
Participants: Lead facilitator
Give your participants a quick break. Quickly sort the identified ITAM opportunities into the three main categories below as best you can.
We’ll use this table as context for the next exercise.
Example: | Optimize Spend | Enhance IT Services | Manage Risk |
ITAM Opportunities |
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Add your results to your copy of the ITAM Strategy Template
1.3 Set ITAM priorities
30 minutes
Input: Organizational strategy documents
Output: A list of prioritized organizational goals, An initial assessment of how ITAM can support these goals
Materials: Whiteboard, The template on the next slide, Your copy of the ITAM Strategy Template
Participants: Asset manager, IT leaders and managers, Business executives or delegates
The objective of this exercise is to prioritize the outcomes your organization wants to achieve from its ITAM practice, given the context from the previous exercises.
Review the image below. The three points of the triangle are the three core goals of ITAM: Enhance IT Service, Manage Risk, and Optimize Spend. This exercise was first developed by Kylie Fowler of ITAM Intelligence. It is an essential exercise to understand ITAM priorities and the tradeoffs associated with those priorities. These priorities aren’t set in stone and should be revisited periodically as technology and business priorities change.
Draw the diagram on the next slide on a whiteboard. Have the most senior leader in the room place the dot on the triangle – the closer it is to any one of the goals, the more important that goal is to the organization. Note: The center of the triangle is off limits! It’s very rarely possible to deliver on all three at once.
Track notes on what’s being prioritized – and why – in the template on the next slide. |
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Add your results to your copy of the ITAM Strategy Template
1.3 Set ITAM Priorities
The priorities of the ITAM practice are to:
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Step 1.4: Identify ITAM goals, target maturity
Participants
- Project sponsor and lead facilitator
- ITAM team
- IT leaders and managers
Outcomes
- Connect executive priorities to ITAM opportunities.
- Set business-aligned priorities for the ITAM practice.
“ITAM is really no different from the other ITIL practices: to succeed, you’ll need some ratio of time, treasure, and talent… and you can make up for less of one with more of the other two.” (Jeremy Boerger, Consultant and Author)
1.4 Identify near- and medium-term goals
15-30 minutes
Input: Organizational strategy documents
Output: A list of prioritized organizational goals, An initial assessment of how ITAM can support these goals
Materials: The table in this slide, Your copy of the ITAM Strategy Template
Participants: ITAM team, IT leaders and managers
Narrow down the list of opportunities to identify specific goals for the ITAM practice.
- Use one color to highlight opportunities you will seize in the next year.
- Use a second color to highlight opportunities you plan to address in the next three years.
- Leave blank anything you don’t intend to address in this timeframe.
The highlighted opportunities are your near- and medium-term objectives.
Optimize Spend | Enhance IT Services | Manage Risk | |
Priority | Critical | Normal | High |
ITAM Opportunities |
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1.4 Connect ITAM goals to tactics
30 minutes
Input: Organizational strategy documents
Output: A list of prioritized organizational goals, An initial assessment of how ITAM can support these goals
Materials: The table in this slide, Your copy of the ITAM Strategy Template
Participants: ITAM team, IT leaders and managers
Let’s dig down a little deeper. Connect the list of opportunities from earlier to specific ITAM tactics that allow the team to seize those opportunities.
Add another row to the earlier table for ITAM tactics. Brainstorm tactics with your participants (e.g. sticky notes on a whiteboard) and align them with the priorities they’ll support.
Optimize Spend | Enhance IT Services | Manage Risk | |
Priority | Critical | Normal | High |
ITAM Opportunities |
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ITAM Tactics to Seize Opportunities |
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Add your results to your copy of the ITAM Strategy Template
1.4 Identify current and target state
20 minutes
Input: Organizational strategy documents
Output: A list of prioritized organizational goals, An initial assessment of how ITAM can support these goals
Materials: The table in this slide, Your copy of the ITAM Strategy Template
Participants: ITAM team, IT leaders and managers
We’ll use this exercise to identify the current and one-year target state of ITAM using Info-Tech’s ITAM maturity framework.
- Review the maturity framework on the next slide as a group.
- In one color, highlight statements that reflect your organization today. Summarize your current state. Are you in firefighter mode? Between “firefighter” and “trusted operator”?
- In a second color, highlight statements that reflect where you want to be one year from today, taking into consideration the goals and tactics identified in the last exercise.
- During a break, copy the highlighted statements to the table on the slide after next, then add this final slide to your working copy of the ITAM Strategy Template.
Add your results to your copy of the ITAM Strategy Template
Establish current and target ITAM maturity
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Innovator – Optimized Asset Management
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Current and target ITAM maturity
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Innovator – Optimized Asset Management Business & Technology Partner – Proactive Asset Management Trusted Operator – Controls Assets Firefighter – Reactive Asset Tracking Unreliable - Struggles to Support |
Step 1.5: Write mission and vision statements
Participants
- Project sponsor and lead facilitator
- ITAM team
- IT leaders and managers
Outcomes
- Write a mission statement that encapsulates the purpose and intentions of the ITAM practice today.
- Write a vision statement that describes what the ITAM practice aspires to become and achieve.
Write vision and mission statements
Create two statements to summarize the role of the ITAM practice today – and where you want it to be in the future.
Create two short, compelling statements that encapsulate:
Why bother creating mission and vision statements? After all, isn’t it just rehashing or re-writing all the work we’ve just done? Isn’t that (at best) a waste of time? There are a few very important reasons to create mission and vision statements:
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“Brevity is the soul of wit.” (Hamlet, Act 2, Scene 2) “Writing is easy. All you have to do is cross out the wrong words.” (Mark Twain) |
1.5 Write an ITAM vision statement
30 minutes
Input: Organizational strategy documents
Output: A list of prioritized organizational goals, An initial assessment of how ITAM can support these goals
Materials: A whiteboard, Your copy of the ITAM Strategy Template
Participants: ITAM team, IT Leaders and managers
Your vision statement describes the ITAM practice as it will be in the far future. It is a target to aspire to, beyond your ability to achieve in the near or medium term.
Examples of ITAM vision statements:
Develop the single accurate view of IT assets, available to anyone who needs it.
Indispensable data brokers that support strategic decisions on the IT environment.
Provide sticky notes to participants. Write out the three questions below on a whiteboard side by side. Have participants write their answers to the questions and post them below the appropriate question. Give everyone 10 minutes to write and post their ideas.
- What’s the desired future state of the ITAM practice?
- What needs to be done to achieved this desired state?
- How do we want ITAM to be perceived in this desired state?
Review the answers and combine them into one focused vision statement. Use the 20x20 rule: take no more than 20 minutes and use no more than 20 words. If you’re not finished after 20 minutes, the ITAM manager should make any final edits offline.
Document your vision statement in your ITAM Strategy Template.
Add your results to your copy of the ITAM Strategy Template
1.5 Write an ITAM mission statement
30 minutes
Input: Organizational strategy documents
Output: A list of prioritized organizational goals, An initial assessment of how ITAM can support these goals
Materials: The table in this slide, Your copy of the ITAM Strategy Template
Participants: ITAM team, IT leaders and managers
Your ITAM mission statement is an expression of what your IT asset management function brings to your organization today. It should be presented in straightforward language that is compelling, easy to understand, and sharply focused.
Examples of ITAM mission statements:
Maintain accurate, actionable, accessible on data on all IT assets.
Support IT and the business with centralized and integrated asset data.
Provide sticky notes to participants. Write out the questions below on a whiteboard side by side. Have participants write their answers to the questions and post them below the appropriate question. Give everyone 10 minutes to write and post their ideas.
- What is our role as the asset management team?
- How do we support the IT and business strategies?
- What does our asset management function offer that no one else can?
Review the answers and combine them into one focused vision statement. Use the 20x20 rule: take no more than 20 minutes and use no more than 20 words. If you’re not finished after 20 minutes, the ITAM manager should make any final edits offline.
Document your vision statement in your ITAM Strategy Template.
Add your results to your copy of the ITAM Strategy Template
Step 1.6: Define ITAM metrics and KPIs
Participants
- Project sponsor and lead facilitator
- ITAM team
- IT leaders and managers
Outcomes
- Identify metrics, data, or reports that may be of interest to different consumers of ITAM data.
- Identify the key performance indicators (KPIs) for the ITAM practice, based on the goals and priorities established earlier.
Navigate a universe of ITAM metricsWhen you have the data, how will you use it?
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ITAM Metrics
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Drill down by:
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Develop different metrics for different teams
A few examples:
- CIOs — CIOs need asset data to govern technology use, align to business needs, and demonstrate IT value. What do we need to budget for hardware and software in the next year? Where can we find money to support urgent new initiatives? How many devices and software titles do we manage compared to last year? How has IT helped the business achieve key goals?
- Asset Managers — Asset managers require data to help them oversee ITAM processes, technology, and staff, and to manage the fleet of IT assets they’re expected to track. What’s the accuracy rate of ITAM data? What’s the state of integrations between ITAM and other systems and processes? How many renewals are coming up in the next 90 days? How many laptops are in stock?
- IT Leaders — IT managers need data that can support their teams and help them manage the technology within their mandate. What technology needs to be reviewed or retired? What do we actually manage?
- Technicians — Service desk technicians need real-time access to data on IT assets to support service requests and incident management – for example, easy access to the list of equipment assigned to a particular user or installed in a particular location.
- Business Managers and Executives — Business managers and executives need concise, readable dashboards to support business decisions about business use of IT assets. What’s our overall asset spend? What’s our forecasted spend? Where could we reallocate spend?
1.6 Identify useful ITAM metrics and reports
60 minutes
Input: Organizational strategy documents
Output: A list of prioritized organizational goals, An initial assessment of how ITAM can support these goals
Materials: The table in this slide, Your copy of the ITAM Strategy Template
Participants: ITAM team, IT leaders and managers
Use this exercise to identify as many potentially useful ITAM metrics and reports as possible, and narrow them down to a few high-priority metrics. Leverage the list of example metrics on the next slide for your own exercise. If you have more than six participants, consider splitting into two or more groups, and divide the table between groups to minimize overlap.
- List potential consumers of ITAM data in the column on the left.
- What type of information do we think this role needs? What questions about IT assets do we get on a regular basis from this role or team?
- Review and consolidate the list as a group. Discuss and highlight any metrics the group thinks are a particularly high priority for tracking.
Role | Compliance | Quality | Quantity | Cost | Time | Progress |
IT Asset Manager | Owned devices not discovered in last 60 days | Discrepancies between discovery data and ITAM DB records | # of corporate-owned devices | Spend on hardware (recent and future/ planned) | Average time, maximum time to deploy end-user devices | Number of ITAM roadmap items in progress |
Service Desk | … |
Add your results to your copy of the ITAM Strategy Template
Examples of ITAM metrics
Compliance | Quality | Quantity | Cost | Time/Duration/Age | Progress |
Owned devices not discovered in last 60 days | Discrepancies between discovery data and ITAM DB records | # of corporate-owned devices | Spend on hardware (recent and future/planned) | Average time, maximum time to deploy end-user devices | Number of ITAM roadmap items in progress or completed |
Disposed devices without certificate of destruction | Breakage rates (in and out of warranty) by vendor | # of devices running software title X, # of licenses for software title X | Spend on software (recent and future/planned) | Average time, maximum time to deploy end user software | Number of integrations between ITAM DB and other sources |
Discrepancies between licenses and install count, by software title | RMAs by vendor, model, equipment type | Number of requests by equipment model or software title | Spend on cloud (recent and future/planned) | Average & total time spent on software audit responses | Number of records in ITAM database |
Compliance reports (e.g. tied to regulatory compliance or grant funding) | Tickets by equipment type or software title | Licenses issued from license pool in the last 30 days | Value of licenses issued from license pool in the last 30 days (cost avoidance) | Devices by age | Software titles with an up-to-date ELP report |
Reports on lost and stolen devices, including last assigned, date reported stolen, actions taken | User device satisfaction scores, CSAT scores | Number of devices retired or donated in last year | Number of IT-managed capital assets | Number of hardware/software request tickets beyond time-to-fulfil targets | Number of devices audited (by ITAM team via self-audit) |
Number of OS versions, unpatched systems | Number of devices due for refresh in the next year | Spend saved by harvesting unused software | Number of software titles, software vendors managed by ITAM team | ||
Audit accuracy rate | Equipment in stock | Cost savings from negotiations | |||
# of users assigned more than one device | Number of non-standard devices or requests | Dollars charged during audit or true-up |
Differentiate between metrics and KPIs
Key performance indicators (KPIs) are metrics with targets aligned to goals.
Targets could include one or more of:
You may track many metrics, but you should have only a few KPIs (typically 2-3 per objective). A breached KPI should be a trigger to investigate and remediate the root cause of the problem, to ensure progress towards goals and priorities can continue. Which KPIs you track will change over the life of the practice, as ITAM goals and priorities shift. For example, KPIs may initially track progress towards maturing ITAM practices. Once you’ve reached target maturity, KPIs may shift to track whether the key service targets are being met. |
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1.6 Identify ITAM KPIs
20 minutes
Input: Organizational strategy documents
Output: A list of prioritized organizational goals, An initial assessment of how ITAM can support these goals
Materials: The table in this slide, Your copy of the ITAM Strategy Template
Participants: ITAM team, IT leaders and managers
Good KPIs are a more objective measure of whether you’re succeeding in meeting the identified priorities for the ITAM practice.
Identify metrics that can measure progress or success against the priorities and goals set earlier. Aim for around three metrics per goal. Identify targets for the metric you think are SMART (specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, and timebound). Track your work using the example table below.
Goal | Metric | Target |
Consolidate major software contracts to drive discounts | Amount spent on top 10 software contracts | Decrease by 10% by next year |
Customer satisfaction scores with enterprise software | Satisfaction is equal to or better than last year | |
Value of licenses issued from license pool | 30% greater than last year | |
Identify abandoned or out-of-spec IT assets | # of security incidents involving undiscovered assets | Zero |
% devices with “Deployed” status in ITAM DB but not discovered for 30+ days | ‹1% of all records in ITAM DB | |
Provide IT asset data to technicians for service calls | Customer satisfaction scores | Satisfaction is equal to or better than last year |
% of end-user devices meeting minimum standards | 97% |
Add your results to your copy of the ITAM Strategy Template
Develop an IT Asset Management Strategy
Phase 2:Identify your approach to support ITAM priorities and goals | Phase 11.1 Define ITAM and brainstorm opportunities and challenges. Executive Alignment Working Session: 1.2 Review organizational priorities, strategy, and key initiatives. 1.3 Align executive priorities with ITAM opportunities & priorities. 1.4 Identify business-aligned ITAM goals and target maturity. 1.5 Write mission and vision statements. 1.6 Define ITAM metrics and KPIs. | Phase 22.1 Define ITAM scope. 2.2 Acquire ITAM services (outsourcing and contracting). 2.3 Centralize or decentralize ITAM capabilities. 2.4 Create a RACI for the ITAM practice. 2.5 Align ITAM with other service management practices. 2.6 Evaluate ITAM tools and integrations. 2.7 Create a plan for internal and external audits. 2.8 Improve your budget processes. 2.9 Establish a documentation framework. 2.10 Create a roadmap and communication plan. |
Phase Outcomes:
Establish an approach to achieving ITAM goals and priorities, including scope, structure, tools, service management integrations, documentation, and more.
Create a roadmap that enables you to realize your approach.
Step 2.1: Define ITAM Scope
Participants
- Project sponsor and lead facilitator
- ITAM team
- IT leaders and managers
- ITAM business partners
Outcomes
- Establish what types of equipment and software you’ll track through the ITAM practice.
- Establish which areas of the business will be in scope of the ITAM practice.
Determine ITAM Scope
Focus on what’s most important and then document it so everyone understands where they can provide the most value.
Not all categories of assets require the same level of tracking, and some equipment and software should be excluded from the ITAM practice entirely.
In some organizations, portions of the environment won’t be tracked by the asset management team at all. For example, some organizations will choose to delegate tracking multi-function printers (MFPs) or proprietary IoT devices to the department or vendor that manages them. Due to resourcing or technical limitations, you may decide that certain equipment or software is out of scope for the moment. |
What do other organizations typically track in detail?
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2.1 Establish scope for ITAM
45 minutes
Input: Organizational strategy documents
Output: ITAM scope, in terms of types of assets tracked and not tracked
Materials: The table in this slide, Your copy of the ITAM Strategy Template
Participants: ITAM team, IT leaders and managers, ITAM business partners
Establish the hardware and software that are within the scope of the ITAM program by updating the tables below to reflect your own environment. The “out of scope” category will include asset types that may be of value to track in the future but for which the capability or need don’t exist today.
Hardware | Software | Out of Scope |
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The following locations will be included in the ITAM program: All North and South America offices and retail locations.
Add your results to your copy of the ITAM Strategy Template
Step 2.2: Acquire ITAM Services
Participants
- Project sponsor and lead facilitator
- ITAM team
- IT leaders and managers
- ITAM business partners
Outcomes
- Define the type of work that may be more effectively or efficiently delivered by an outsourcer or contractor.
“We would like our clients to come to us with an idea of where they want to get to. Why are you doing this? Is it for savings? Because you want to manage your security attack surface? Are there digital initiatives you want to move forward? What is the end goal?” (Mike Austin, MetrixData 360)
Effectively acquire ITAM services
Allow your team to focus on strategic, value-add activities by acquiring services that free them from commodity tasks.
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Business Enablement
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![]() Vendor’s Performance Advantage
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Decide what to outsource
It’s rarely all or nothing.
Ask yourself:
You may ultimately choose to engage a single vendor or a combination of multiple vendors who can best meet your ITAM needs. Establishing effective vendor management processes, where you can maximize the amount of service you receive while relying on the vendor’s expertise and ability to scale, can help you make your asset management practice a net cost-saver. |
ITAM activities and capabilities
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ITAM-adjacent activities and capabilities
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2.2 Identify outsourcing opportunities
1-2 hours
Input: Understanding of current ITAM processes and challenges
Output: Understanding of potential outsourcing opportunities
Materials: The table in this slide, and insight in previous slides, Your copy of the ITAM Strategy Template
Participants: ITAM team, IT leaders and managers, ITAM business partners
At a high level, discuss which functions of ITAM are good candidates for outsourcing.
Start with the previous slide for examples of outsourcing activities or capabilities directly related to or adjacent to the ITAM practice. Categorize these activities as follows:
Outsource | Potentially Outsource | Insource |
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Go through the list of activities to potentially or definitely outsource and confirm:
- Will outsourcing solve a resourcing need for an existing process, or can you deliver this adequately in-house?
- Will outsourcing improve the effectiveness and efficiency of current processes? Will it deliver more effective service channels or improved levels of reliability and performance consistency?
- Will outsourcing provide or enable enhanced service capabilities that your IT customers could use, and which you cannot deliver in-house due to lack of scale or capacity?
Answering “no” to more than one of these questions suggests a need to further review options to ensure the goals are aligned with the potential value of the service offerings available.
Add your results to your copy of the ITAM Strategy Template
Step 2.3: Centralize or decentralize ITAM capabilities
Participants
- Project sponsor and lead facilitator
- ITAM team
- IT leaders and managers
- ITAM business partners
Outcomes
- Outline where the team(s) responsible for ITAM sit across the organization, who they report to, and who they need to work with across IT and the business.
Align ITAM with IT’s structure
ITAM’s structure will typically align with the larger business and IT structure. The wrong structure will undermine your ability to meet ITAM goals and lead to frustration, missed work, inefficiency, and loss of value.
Which of the four archetypes below reflects the structure you need?
- Centralized — ITAM is entirely centralized in a single function, which reports into a central IT department.
- Decentralized — Local IT groups are responsible and accountable for ITAM. They may coordinate informally but do not report to any central team.
- Hybrid-Shared Services — Local IT can opt in to shared services but must follow centrally set ITAM practices to do so, usually with support from a shared ITAM function.
- Hybrid-Federated — Local IT departments are free to develop their own approach to ITAM outside of core, centrally set requirements.
Centralized ITAM
Total coordination, control, and oversight
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Example: Centralized
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Decentralized ITAM
Maximize choice
| Example: Decentralized
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Hybrid: Federation
Centralization with a light touch
| Example: Federation
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Hybrid: Shared Services
Optional centralization
| Example: Shared Services
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Structure data collection & analysis
Consider the implications of structure on data.
Why centralize?
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Why decentralize?
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Requirements for success:
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Requirements for success:
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Structure budget and contract management
Contract consolidation creates economies of scale for vendor management and license pooling that strengthen your negotiating position with vendors and optimize spend.
Why centralize?
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Why decentralize?
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Requirements for success:
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Requirements for success:
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Structure technology management
Are there opportunities to centralize or decentralize support functions?
Why centralize?
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Why decentralize?
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Requirements for success:
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Requirements for success:
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2.3 Review ITAM Structure
1-2 hours
Input: Understanding of current organizational structure, Understanding of challenges and opportunities related to the current structure
Output: A list of prioritized organizational goals, An initial assessment of how ITAM can support these goals
Materials: The table in this slide, Your copy of the ITAM Strategy Template
Participants: ITAM team, IT leaders and managers, ITAM business partners
Outline the current model for your organization and identify opportunities to centralize or decentralize ITAM-related activities.
- What model best describes how ITAM should be structured in your organization? Modify the slide outlining structure as a group to outline your own organization, as required.
- In the table below, outline opportunities to centralize or decentralize data tracking, budget and contract management, and technology management activities.
Centralize | Decentralize | |
Data collection & analysis |
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Budget and contract management |
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Technology management |
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Add your results to your copy of the ITAM Strategy Template
Step 2.4: Create a RACI
Participants
- Project sponsor and lead facilitator
- ITAM team
- IT leaders and managers
- ITAM business partners
Outcomes
- Review the role of the IT asset manager.
- Identify who’s responsible, accountable, consulted, and informed for key ITAM activities.
Empower your asset manager
The asset manager is the critical ITAM role. Ensure they’re positioned to succeed.
There’s too much change in the technology and business environment to expect ITAM to be “a problem to solve.” It is a practice that requires care and feeding through regular iteration to achieve success. At the helm of this practice is your asset manager, whose approach and past experience will have a significant impact on how you approach ITAM.
The asset manager role requires a variety of skills, knowledge, and abilities including:
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“Where your asset manager sits, and what past experience they have, is going to influence how they do asset management.” (Jeremy Boerger, Consultant & Author) “It can be annoying at times, but a good IT asset manager will poke their nose into activities that do not obviously concern them, such as programme and project approval boards and technical design committees. Their aim is to identify and mitigate ITAM risks BEFORE the technology is deployed as well as to ensure that projects and solutions ‘bake in’ the necessary processes and tools that ensure IT assets can be managed effectively throughout their lifecycle.” (Kylie Fowler, ITAM by Design, 2017) |
IT asset managers must have a range of skills and knowledge
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Assign ITAM responsibilities and accountabilities
Align authority and accountability.
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2.4 Conduct a RACI Exercise
1-2 hours
Input: An understanding of key roles and activities in ITAM practices, An understanding of your organization, High-level structure of your ITAM program
Output: A RACI diagram for IT asset management
Materials: The table in the next slide, Your copy of the ITAM Strategy Template
Participants: ITAM team, IT leaders and managers, ITAM business partners
Let’s face it – RACI exercises can be dry. We’ve found that the approach below is more collaborative, engaging, and effective compared to filling out the table as a large group.
- Create a shared working copy of the RACI charts on the following slides (e.g. write it out on a whiteboard or provide a link to this document and work directly in it).
- Review the list of template roles and activities as a group. Add, change, or remove roles and activities from the table as needed.
- Divide into small groups. Assign each group a set of roles, and have them define whether that role is accountable, responsible, consulted, or informed for each activity in the chart. Refer to the previous slide for context on RACI. Give everyone 15 minutes to update their section of the chart.
- Come back together as a large group to review the chart. First, check for accountability – there should generally be just one role accountable for each activity. Then, have each small group walk through their section, and encourage participants to ask questions. Is there at least one role responsible for each task, and what are they responsible for? Does everyone listed as consulted or informed really need to be? Make any necessary adjustments.
Add your results to your copy of the ITAM Strategy Template
Define ITAM governance activities
Document asset management responsibilities and accountabilities
Step 2.5: Align ITAM with other Service Management Practices
Participants
- Project sponsor and lead facilitator
- ITAM team
- IT leaders and managers
Outcomes
- Establish shared and separate responsibilities for asset and configuration management.
- Identify how ITAM can support other practices, and how other practices can support ITAM.
Asset vs. Configuration
Asset and configuration management look at the same world through different lenses.- IT asset management tends to focus on each IT asset in its own right: assignment or ownership, its lifecycle, and related financial obligations and entitlements.
- Configuration management is focused on configuration items (CIs) that must be managed to deliver a service and the relationships and integrations to other CIs.
- ITAM and configuration management teams and practices should work closely together. Though asset and configuration management focus on different outcomes, they tend use overlapping tools and data sets. Each practice, when working effectively, can strengthen the other.
- Many objects will exist in both the CMDB and AMDB, and the data on those shared objects will need to be kept in sync.
Configuration Management Database (CMDB)A database of uniquely identified configuration items (CIs). Each CI record may include information on:Service AttributesSupported Service(s)
CI RelationshipsPhysical Connections
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Hardware InformationSerial, Model and Specs
Software InstallationsHypervisor & OS
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Asset Management Database (AMDB)A database of uniquely identified IT assets. Each asset record may include information on:Procurement/PurchasingPurchase Request/Purchase Order
Asset AttributesModel, Title, Product Info, License Key
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IT Security SystemsVulnerability Management
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IT Service Management (ITSM) SystemChange Tickets
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Financial System/ERPGeneral Ledger
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2.5 Integrate ITAM and configuration practices
45 minutes
Input: Knowledge of the organization’s configuration management processes
Output: Define how ITAM and configuration management will support one another
Materials: The table in this slide, Your copy of the ITAM Strategy Template
Participants: ITAM team, IT leaders and managers, Configuration manager
Work through the table below to identify how you will collaborate and synchronize data across ITAM and configuration management practices and tools.
What are the goals (if any currently exist) for the configuration management practice? | Connect configuration items to services to support service management. |
How will configuration and asset management teams collaborate? | Weekly status updates. As-needed working sessions.
Shared visibility on each others’ Kanban tracker. Create tickets to raise and track issues that require collaboration or attention from the other team. |
How can config leverage ITAM? | Connect CIs to financial, contractual, and ownership data. |
How can ITAM leverage config? | Connect assets to services, changes, incidents. |
What key fields will be primarily tracked/managed by ITAM? | Serial number, unique ID, user, location, PO number, … |
What key fields will be primarily tracked/managed by configuration management? | Supported service(s), dependencies, service description, service criticality, network address… |
Add your results to your copy of the ITAM Strategy Template
ITAM supports service management
Decoupling asset management from other service management practices can result in lost value. Establish how asset management can support other service management practices – and how those practices can support ITAM.
Incident Management
What broke?
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ITAM
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Request Management
What can this user request or purchase?
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What IT assets are related to the known issue?
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What assets are related to the change?
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2.5. Connect with other IT service practices
45 minutes
Input: Knowledge of existing organizational IT service management processes
Output: Define how ITAM will help other service management processes, and how other service management processes will help ITAM
Materials: The table in this slide, Your copy of the ITAM Strategy Template
Participants: ITAM team, IT leaders and managers, Service leads
Complete the table below to establish what ITAM can provide to other service management practices, and what other practices can provide to ITAM.
Practice | ITAM will help | Will help ITAM |
Incident Management | Provide context on assets involved in an incident (e.g. ownership, service contracts). | Track when assets are involved in incidents (via incident tickets). |
Request Management | Oversee request & procurement processes. Help develop asset standards. | Enter new assets in ITAM database. |
Problem Management | Collect information on assets related to known issues. | Report back on models/titles that are generating known issues. |
Change Enablement | Provide context on assets for change review. | Ensure EOL assets are retired and licenses are returned during changes. |
Capacity Management | Identify ownership, location for assets at capacity. | Identify upcoming refreshes or purchases. |
Availability Management | Connect uptime and reliability to assets. | Identify assets that are causing availability issues. |
Monitoring and Event Management | Provide context to events with asset data. | Notify asset of unrecognized software and hardware. |
Financial Management | Establish current and predict future spending. | Identify upcoming purchases, renewals. |
Add your results to your copy of the ITAM Strategy Template
Step 2.6: Evaluate ITAM tools and integrations
Participants
- Project sponsor and lead facilitator
- ITAM team
- IT leaders and managers
Outcomes
- Create a list of the ITAM tools currently in use, how they’re used, and their current limitations.
- Identify new tools that could provide value to the ITAM practice, and what needs to be done to acquire and implement them.
“Everything is connected. Nothing is also connected.” (Dirk Gently’s Holistic Detective Agency)
Establish current strengths and gaps in your ITAM toolset
ITAM data quality relies on tools and integrations that are managed by individuals or teams who don’t report directly to the ITAM function.
Without direct line of sight into tools management, the ITAM team must influence rather than direct improvement initiatives that are in some cases critical to the performance of the ITAM function. To more effectively influence improvement efforts, you must explicitly identify what you need, why you need it, from which tools, and from which stakeholders.
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“Active Directory plays a huge role in audit defense and self-assessment, but no-one really goes out there and looks at Active Directory.
I was talking to one organization that has 1,600,000 AD records for 100,000 employees.” (Mike Austin, Founder, MetrixData 360) |
2.6 Evaluate ITAM existing technologies
30 minutes
Input: Knowledge of existing ITAM tools
Output: A list of prioritized organizational goals, An initial assessment of how ITAM can support these goals
Materials: The table in this slide, Your copy of the ITAM Strategy Template
Participants: ITAM team, IT leaders and managers
Identify the use, limitations, and next steps for existing ITAM tools, including those not directly managed by the ITAM team.
- What tools do we have today?
- What are they used for? What are their limitations?
- Who manages them?
- What actions could we take to maximize the value of the tools?
Existing Tool | Use | Constraints | Owner | Proposed Action? |
ITAM Module |
|
|
ITAM Team/Service Management |
|
Active Directory |
|
Major data quality issues | IT Operations |
|
Add your results to your copy of the ITAM Strategy Template
2.6 Identify potential new tools
30 minutes
Input: Knowledge of tooling gaps, An understanding of available tools that could remediate gaps
Output: New tools that can improve ITAM capabilities, including expected value and proposed next steps
Materials: The table in this slide, Your copy of the ITAM Strategy Template
Participants: ITAM team, IT leaders and managers
Identify tools that are required to support the identified goals of the ITAM practice.
- What types of tools do we need that we don’t have?
- What could these tools help us do?
- What needs to be done next to investigate or acquire the appropriate tool?
New Tool | Expected Value | Proposed Next Steps |
SAM tool |
|
|
Add your results to your copy of the ITAM Strategy Template
Step 2.7: Create a plan for internal and external audits
Participants
- Project sponsor and lead facilitator
- ITAM team
- IT leaders and managers
- ITAM business partners
Outcomes
- Establish your approach to internal data audits.
- Create a high-level response plan for external audits.
Validate ITAM data via internal audits
Data audits provide assurance that the records in the ITAM database are as accurate as possible. Consider these three approaches:
Compare Tool Records
Audit your data by comparing records in the ITAM system to other discovery sources.
|
IT-led Audit
Conduct a hands-on investigation led by ITAM staff and IT technicians.
|
User-led audit
Have users validate the IT assets assigned to them.
|
2.7 Set an approach to internal data audits
30 minutes
Input: An understanding of current data audit capabilities and needs
Output: An outline of how you’ll approach data audits, including frequency, scope, required resources
Materials: Your copy of the ITAM Strategy Template
Participants: ITAM team
Review the three internal data audit approaches outlined on the previous slide, and identify which of the three approaches you’ll use. For each approach, complete the fields in the table below.
Audit Approach | How often? | What scope? | Who’s involved? | Comments |
Compare tool records | Monthly | Compare ITAM DB, Intune/ConfigMgr, and Vulnerability Scanner Data; focus on end-user devices to start | Asset manager will lead at first.
Work with tool admins to pull data and generate reports. |
|
IT-led audit | Annual | End-user devices at a subset of locations | Asset manager will work with ITSM admins to generate reports. In-person audit to be conducted by local techs. | |
User-led audit | Annual | Assigned personal devices (start with a pilot group) | Asset coordinator to develop procedure with ITSM admin. Run pilot with power users first. |
Add your results to your copy of the ITAM Strategy Template
Prepare for and respond to external audits and true-ups
Are you ready when software vendors come knocking?
| “If software audits are a big part of your asset operations, you have problems. You can reduce the time spent on audits and eliminate some audits by having a proactive ITAM practice.” (Sandi Conrad, Principal Research Director)Info-Tech InsightAudit defense starts long before you get audited. For an in-depth review of your audit approach, see Info-Tech’s Prepare and Defend Against a Software Audit. |
Identify areas of higher audit risk
Watch for these warning signs
|
“The reality is, software vendors prey on confusion and complication. Where there’s confusion, there’s opportunity.” (Mike Austin, Founder, MetrixData 360) |
Develop an audit response plan
You will be on the clock once the vendor sends you an audit request. Have a plan ready to go.
|
|
2.7 Clarify your vendor audit response plan
1 hour
Input: Organizational knowledge on your current audit response procedures
Output: Audit response team membership, High-level audit checklist, A list of things to start, stop, and continue doing as part of the audit response
Materials: Your copy of the ITAM Strategy Template
Participants: ITAM team, IT leaders and managers, ITAM business partners
- Who’s on the audit response team, and what’s their role? Who will lead the team? Who will be the point of contact with the auditor?
- What are the high-level steps in our audit response workflow? Use the example checklist below as a starting point.
- What do we need to start, stop, and continue doing in response to audit requests?
Example Audit Checklist
- Bring the audit request received to the attention of ITAM and IT leadership. Assemble the response team.
- Acknowledge receipt of audit notice.
- Negotiate timing and scope of the audit.
- Direct staff not to remove or acquire licenses for software under audit without directly involving the ITAM team first.
- Gather installation data and documentation to establish current entitlements, including original contract, current contract, addendums, receipts, invoices.
- Compare entitlements to installed software.
- Investigate any anomalies (e.g. unexpected or non-compliant software).
- Review results with the audit response team.
Add your results to your copy of the ITAM Strategy Template
Step 2.8: Improve budget processes
Participants
- Project sponsor and lead facilitator
- ITAM team
- IT leaders and managers
- ITAM business partners
Outcomes
- Identify what you need to start, stop, and continue to do to support budgeting processes.
Improve budgeting and forecasting
Insert ITAM into budgeting processes to deliver significant value.
Some examples of what ITAM can bring to the budgeting table:
Being part of the budgeting process positions ITAM for success in other ways:
|
“Knowing what you have [IT assets] is foundational to budgeting, managing, and optimizing IT spend.” (Dave Kish, Info-Tech, Practice Lead, IT Financial Management) ![]() |
2.8 Build better budgets
20 minutes
Input: Context on IT budgeting processes
Output: A list of things to start, stop, and continue doing as part of budgeting exercises
Materials: The table in this slide, Your copy of the ITAM Strategy Template
Participants: ITAM team, IT leaders and managers, ITAM business partners
What should we start, stop, and continue doing to support organizational budgeting exercises?
Start | Stop | Continue |
|
|
|
Add your results to your copy of the ITAM Strategy Template
Step 2.9: Establish a documentation framework
Participants
- Project sponsor and lead facilitator
- ITAM team
Outcomes
- Identify key documentation and gaps in your documentation.
- Establish where documentation should be stored, who should own it, who should have access, and what should trigger a review.
Create ITAM documentation
ITAM documentation will typically support governance or operations.
Long-term planning and governance
Operational documentation
|
|
Consider ITAM policies
Create policies that can and will be monitored and enforced.
|
2.9 Establish documentation gaps
15-30 minutes
Input: An understanding of existing documentation gaps and risks
Output: Documentation gaps, Identified owners, repositories, access rights, and review/update protocols
Materials: The table in this slide, Your copy of the ITAM Strategy Template
Participants: ITAM team, Optional: IT managers, ITAM business partners
Discuss and record the following:
- What planning/governance, operational, and tooling documentation do we still need to create? Who is accountable for the creation and maintenance of these documents?
- Where will the documentation be stored? Who can access these documents?
- What will trigger reviews or changes to the documents?
Need to Create | Owner | Stored in | Accessible by | Trigger for review |
Hardware asset management SOP | ITAM manager | ITAM SharePoint site › Operating procedures folder |
|
|
Add your results to your copy of the ITAM Strategy Template
Step 2.10: Create a roadmap and communication plan
Participants
- Project sponsor and lead facilitator
- ITAM team
- IT leaders and managers
Outcomes
- A timeline of key ITAM initiatives.
- Improvement ideas aligned to key initiatives.
- A communication plan tailored to key stakeholders.
- Your ITAM Strategy document.
“Understand that this is a journey. This is not a 90-day project. And in some organizations, these journeys could be three or five years long.” (Mike Austin, MetrixData 360)
2.10 Identify key ITAM initiatives
30-45 minutes
Input: Organizational strategy documents
Output: A roadmap that outlines next steps
Materials: The table in this slide, Your copy of the ITAM Strategy Template
Participants: ITAM team, IT leaders and managers, Project sponsor
- Identify key initiatives that are critical to improving practice maturity and meeting business goals.
- There should only be a handful of really key initiatives. This is the work that will have the greatest impact on your ability to deliver value. Too many initiatives muddy the narrative and can distract from what really matters.
- Plot the target start and end dates for each initiative in the business and IT transformation timeline you created in Phase 1.
- Review the chart and consider – what new capabilities should the ITAM practice have once the identified initiatives are complete? What transformational initiatives will you be better positioned to support?
Add your results to your copy of the ITAM Strategy Template
Transformation Timeline
2.10 Align improvement ideas to initiatives
45 minutes
Input: Key initiatives, Ideas for ITAM improvement collected over the course of previous exercises
Output: Concrete action items to support each initiative
Materials: The table in the next slide, Your copy of the ITAM Strategy Template
Participants: ITAM team, IT leaders and managers, Project sponsor
As you’ve been working through the previous exercises, you have been tracking ideas for improvement – now we’ll align them to your roadmap.
- Review the list of ideas for improvement you’ve produced over the working sessions. Consolidate the list – are there any ideas that overlap or complement each other? Record any new ideas. Frame each idea as an action item – something you can actually do.
- Connect the action items to initiatives. It may be that not every action item becomes part of a key initiative. (Don’t lose ideas that aren’t part of key initiatives – track them in a separate burndown list or backlog.)
- Identify a target completion date and owner for each action item that’s part of an initiative.
Add your results to your copy of the ITAM Strategy Template
Example ITAM initiatives
Initiative 1: Develop hardware/software standards | ||
Task | Target Completion | Owner |
Laptop standards | Q1-2023 | ITAM manager |
Identify/eliminate contracts for unused software using scan tool | Q2-2023 | ITAM manager |
Review O365 license levels and standard service | Q3-2023 | ITAM manager |
Initiative 2: Improve ITAM data quality | ||
Task | Target Completion | Owner |
Implement scan agent on all field laptops | Q3-2023 | Desktop engineer |
Conduct in person audit on identified data discrepancies | Q1-2024 | ITAM team |
Develop and run user-led audit | Q1-2024 | Asset manager |
Initiative 3: Acquire & implement a new ITAM tool | ||
Task | Target Completion | Owner |
Select an ITAM tool | Q3-2023 | ITAM manager |
Implement ITAM tool, incl. existing data migration | Q1-2024 | ITAM manager |
Training on new tool | Q1-2024 | ITAM manager |
Build KPIs, executive dashboards in new tool | Q2-2024 | Data analyst |
Develop user-led audit functionality in new tool | Q3-2024 | ITAM coordinator |
2.10 Create a communication plan
45 minutes
Input: Proposed ITAM initiatives, Stakeholder priorities and goals, and an understanding of how ITAM can help them meet those goals
Output: A high-level communication plan to communicate the benefits and impact of proposed changes to the ITAM program
Materials: The table in this slide, Your copy of the ITAM Strategy Template
Participants: IT asset manager, Project sponsor
Develop clear, consistent, and targeted messages to key ITAM stakeholders.
- Modify the list of stakeholders in the first column.
- What benefits should those stakeholders realize from ITAM? What impact may the proposed improvements have on them? Refer back to exercises from Phase 1, where you identified key stakeholders, their priorities, and how ITAM could help them.
- Identify communication channels (in-person, email, all-hands meeting, etc.) and timing – when you’ll distribute the message. You may choose to use more than one channel, and you may need to convey the message more than once.
Group | ITAM Benefits | Impact | Channel(s) | Timing |
CFO |
|
|
Face-to-face – based on their availability | Within the next month |
CIO |
|
|
Standing bi-monthly 1:1 meetings | Review strategy at next meeting |
IT Managers | ||||
Field Techs |
Add your results to your copy of the ITAM Strategy Template
2.10 Put the final touches on your ITAM Strategy
30 minutes
Input: Proposed ITAM initiatives, Stakeholder priorities and goals, and an understanding of how ITAM can help them meet those goals
Output: A high-level communication plan to communicate the benefits and impact of proposed changes to the ITAM program
Materials: The table in this slide, Your copy of the ITAM Strategy Template
Participants: IT asset manager, Project sponsor
You’re almost done! Do a final check of your work before you send a copy to your participants.
- Summarize in three points the key findings from the activities you’ve worked through. What have you learned? What are your priorities? What key message do you need to get across? Add these to the appropriate slide near the start of the ITAM Strategy Template.
- What are your immediate next steps? Summarize no more than five and add them to the appropriate slide near the start of the ITAM Strategy Template.
- Are you asking for something? Approval for ITAM initiatives? Funding? Resources? Clearly identify the ask as part of your next steps.
- Are the KPIs identified in Phase 1 still valid? Will they help you monitor for success in the initiatives you’ve identified in Phase 2? Make any adjustments you think are required to the KPIs to reflect the additional completed work.
Add your results to your copy of the ITAM Strategy Template
Research Contributors and Experts
Kylie Fowler
Principal Consultant ITAM Intelligence Kylie is an experienced ITAM/FinOps consultant with a track record of creating superior IT asset management frameworks that enable large companies to optimize IT costs while maintaining governance and control. She has operated as an independent consultant since 2009, enabling organizations including Sainsbury's and DirectLine Insurance to leverage the benefits of IT asset management and FinOps to achieve critical business objectives. Recent key projects include defining an end-to-end SAM strategy, target operating model, policies and processes which when implemented provided a 300% ROI. She is passionate about supporting businesses of all sizes to drive continuous improvement, reduce risk, and achieve return on investment through the development of creative asset management and FinOps solutions. |
Rory Canavan
Owner and Principal Consultant SAM Charter Rory is the founder, owner, and principal consultant of SAM Charter, an internationally recognized consultancy in enterprise-wide Software & IT Asset Management. As an industry leader, SAM Charter is uniquely poised to ensure your IT & SAM systems are aligned to your business requirements. With a technical background in business and systems analysis, Rory has a wide range of first-hand experience advising numerous companies and organizations on the best practices and principles pertaining to software asset management. This experience has been gained in both military and civil organizations, including the Royal Navy, Compaq, HP, the Federation Against Software Theft (FAST), and several software vendors. |
Research Contributors and Experts
Jeremy Boerger
Founder, Boerger Consulting Author of Rethinking IT Asset Management Jeremy started his career in ITAM fighting the Y2K bug at the turn of the 21st century. Since then, he has helped companies in manufacturing, healthcare, banking, and service industries build and rehabilitate hardware and software asset management practices. These experiences prompted him to create the Pragmatic ITAM method, which directly addresses and permanently resolves the fundamental flaws in current ITAM and SAM implementations. In 2016, he founded Boerger Consulting, LLC to help business leaders and decision makers fully realize the promises a properly functioning ITAM can deliver. In his off time, you will find him in Cincinnati, Ohio, with his wife and family. |
Mike Austin
Founder and CEO MetrixData 360 Mike Austin leads the delivery team at MetrixData 360. Mike brings more than 15 years of Microsoft licensing experience to his clients’ projects. He assists companies, from Fortune 500 to organizations with as few as 500 employees, with negotiations of Microsoft Enterprise Agreements (EA), Premier Support Contracts, and Select Agreements. In addition to helping negotiate contracts, he helps clients build and implement software asset management processes. Previously, Mike was employed by Microsoft for more than 8 years as a member of the global sales team. With Microsoft, Mike successfully negotiated more than a billion dollars in new and renewal EAs. Mike has also negotiated legal terms and conditions for all software agreements, developed Microsoft’s best practices for global account management, and was awarded Microsoft’s Gold Star Award in 2003 and Circle of Excellence in 2008 for his contributions. |
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