After a carve-out, the chemical park operator Currenta was faced with the challenge of defining its own processes and bringing them to life. That is why Currenta moved its IT service management to its own ServiceNow platform. agineo and Materna TMT supported the change and ensured optimized processes and the best possible user acceptance.
Before the sale, the parent company provided a shared instance of ServiceNow that the chemical park operator could use. However, Currenta had no way of defining its own processes or implementing its own requirements. Having its own ServiceNow platform offers Currenta more flexibility and the ability to design its own processes and develop them according to its requirements. In this context, Currenta planned to move further processes and functionalities to the platform. This also includes the introduction of customer service management. CSM aims to provide standardized and modern processes for the companies that Currenta supports. This includes the introduction of a self-service portal and a simple online contact system.
agineo, the ServiceNow specialist of the Materna Group, is a strong partner for Currenta, providing support from the initial consultation and design to implementation and training. To ensure that the 3,400 employees understand the changeover and can work with the new processes, Materna TMT, the digital learning specialist, has created a series of explanatory videos to accompany the rollout.
A customized ITSM solution
First, agineo designed a migration plan for the individual project steps, including a cost estimate for the transition from the previous solution to a dedicated ITSM environment. The ServiceNow experts then began transitioning the incident, problem, change, knowledge and service request management processes. In doing so, the project partners closely followed the ServiceNow standard. This enables smooth operation of the platform and very little effort during upgrades to new versions. Users can take advantage of the new features of the upgrade immediately. In addition, the standard-based approach also results in significant operational savings.
The ITSM solution placed a strong focus on service request management. The experts developed a well-functioning development process in collaboration with the customer. This process takes clear requirements from the business department, integrates them into the design of the service request, and, after refinement, implements them in expert consulting by the project team. This enabled the agineo project team to successfully integrate a large number of different service requests. Among other things, the experts linked several service requests with interfaces such as SAP PI (Process Integration) and Datanet, the platform for managing, processing, billing and evaluating all activities related to telecommunications connections and IT service accounting. For example, employees can use the SAP PI interface to initiate orders for standard printers and orders for computers and accessories directly from within ServiceNow.
Currently, Currenta still uses the tool helpLine as a configuration management database (CMDB) for some device types. The final replacement of helpLine is already planned, in which agineo will provide support through workshops and weekly consultations. The focus here is particularly on the CMDB with CI and asset management. The development of the CMDB plays an important role in order to document and manage all CIs and assets in a comprehensible way and to be able to offer a structured service catalog. For example, users can request the “order/edit/delete a server” via the service portal. Although Currenta drives the continuous improvement process itself, it relies on the transformation expertise of agineo’s ITSM experts.
Knowledge for Everyone
agineo has also implemented other areas, such as knowledge management, fundamentally and close to the standard: employees have access to a knowledge database with articles on topics such as security, applications, software, and much more. There they can find answers to their questions, which ideally means that they do not even have to open a ticket. If a ticket is created anyway, the agents can use suggested articles from the knowledge base to process tickets faster or, in the best case, solve them directly. agineo is continuously implementing further developments and improvements. In the long term, the ServiceNow experts will support Currenta with a rent-an-admin concept, for example, to provide support in the areas of support, administration, and application management, and to avoid having to implement smaller requirements in a project-like manner.
Customer-friendly processes
In addition to ServiceNow’s IT service management, the group also introduced a new customer service management system. The focus of the CSM solution was to design processes in a standardized and digital way. In the past, different input channels and diverse working methods led to a lack of structure, no clear responsibilities and long processing times for customer inquiries. For this reason, the project partners introduced a new customer portal and standardized and harmonized the customer service management processes. This ensures automated routing to the correct contact persons. They can access existing knowledge and distribute it in a targeted manner.
Training employees
From the outset, Currenta relied on an accompanying training and communication concept to get all employees on board and to prepare them for working with the new solution. There were two basic training requirements:
- Users should know and understand the basic functions and standard processes of a module in ServiceNow.
- Users should get to know the advantages of the new ServiceNow instance (simplicity, efficiency, sustainability) and develop a positive attitude towards the change of the new solution through professional support.
agineo accompanied the changeover over several weeks with online training on incident, problem, change, knowledge and service request management. In the first step, the experts presented the standard process universally and then explained the processes using a use case. After the presentation, the employees were able to carry out the use case themselves again and ask questions.
Since not all users could be trained at the same time and new employees are regularly added, an additional solution for ongoing training was needed. To support the online training, Materna TMT added further media formats. The experts in digital learning and change management designed and produced five explanatory films and a mood trailer. The explanatory films each consist of an animated film and a screencast (screenshot of the screen) and create the knowledge base for using the individual modules. The aim was to enable employees to learn about the processes and understand how to use them. The Mood Trailer was used to inform employees and prepare them positively for the change.
What are the results?
Today, Currenta has its own ServiceNow platform with proven ITSM and CSM processes, based on a healthy CMDB, and can thus offer a well-stocked service catalog. Interfaces, such as Datanet and SAP PI, ensure end-to-end automated processes.
Currenta achieved good results at all levels: via the newly established customer portal, customers can quickly and conveniently reach the responsible departments, which directly provide customer-specific services such as activating websites, relocating printers and requesting a LAN port.
In addition, automation has eliminated many manual steps that were previously necessary. The new ServiceNow solution has given Currenta greater flexibility overall: Currenta is the administrator of its own solution, not just a user, can optimize processes more easily, and provides an even better user experience.
Advantages from the customer’s point of view
- Self-managed platform that Currenta is constantly improving independently and with the help of agineo
- Sovereignty over processes, interfaces, and responsibilities
- Automation reduces manual steps
- Interlinking of ITSM and CSM processes on one platform
- Lower license costs by replacing other systems
- Simultaneous teaching of ServiceNow basics for all users:
- Learning content can be stored directly in ServiceNow (in the knowledge database).
- Explanatory films have a high information density, are very time efficient, and only take five to eight minutes.
- Explainer videos are part of the knowledge database and can be referenced.
About the Currenta Group
As manager and operator of Chempark, with sites in Leverkusen, Dormagen and Krefeld-Uerdingen, Currenta maintains one of Germany’s largest chemical parks at one of Europe’s largest industrial sites. At the three Chempark sites, Currenta provides chemical and technical services for a total of around 70 companies at Chempark. These include utilities, waste management, infrastructure, safety and security, analytics and vocational training. The two subsidiaries Tectrion GmbH and Chemion Logistik GmbH also provide services such as maintenance and logistics. Currenta GmbH & Co. OHG has been operating on the market as Currenta since 2008 and employs around 3,400 people (approx. 5,400 employees incl. subsidiaries), with whom a turnover of approx. €2.0 billion (€2.3 billion incl. subsidiaries) was generated in 2021.