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Sometimes, when handling incoming requests, it might not be clear whether the work should be tracked as a ticket or as a project – especially if you’re using an ITSM tool that doesn’t give you a holistic view of all tickets and projects happening within your organization.
Here are some tips you can use to determine which makes the most sense based on the issue and your IT Service Management (ITSM) and Project Portfolio Management (PPM) processes.
Projects have a definite start and end. These define the project life cycle. Projects are usually started to generate a product or achieve a specific outcome. The work is unique and does not include ongoing work, operations or processes that follow existing procedures.
Tickets, on the other hand, are typically used for expected events that come up in the regular course of business such as incidents, service requests, change requests or regular operations tasks. There are processes and resources in place to handle these work items.
So, using those definitions, let’s look at a few examples of requests that a help desk might get, and use some questions to determine if the requests should stay tickets or become projects.
For the first example, a request is received asking, “Can you replace all of the Wi-Fi in the library?” Here are a few questions you could ask to evaluate if it should be a ticket or a project:
Given the definitions we have for a ticket vs a project, we can determine that this request to replace the Wi-Fi in the library should be handled as a one-time project.
Here’s another example. The IT help desk has received the following request, “My ID card is not scanning correctly in the cafeteria.” Here are the questions to ask for evaluation:
Based on the answers, and the definitions we are working with for projects vs. tickets, this request would be processed as a ticket.
One other way some organizations may determine a ticket vs a project is to use a list of abstract criteria to determine when a ticket should become a project. That list often includes the following:
The discipline of project management includes many processes that can help ensure that large, risky projects (something like replacing a highway bridge during a weekend, for example) are successfully completed. However, not all processes are necessary for every project.
It can be helpful to define the required activities for every project, plus optional activities that may be undertaken at the project manager’s discretion. Having a defined list of tiers of projects that correspond to the rough complexity of the project can be used as a reference when determining what is needed for your projects. By using a defined list of tiers for projects you can remove ambiguity and create consistency across your projects.
Examples of Project Tiers
If you’re curious about what project tiers might look like in an organization, we’ve pulled together an example list of tiers that you can use as a starting point for defining standard sizes for your organization.
Tier One (Small)
Description:
Required project management activities:
Tier Two (Medium)
Description:
Required project management activities:
Tier Three (Large)
Description:
Required project management activities:
By bringing ITSM and PPM together on a single platform, you can better understand your resource capabilities and engage in true resource capacity planning.
In addition, using a single platform for ITSM and PPM makes it easier to turn tickets into projects as you don’t need to switch between different tools. In addition, you have better transparency and can see all of the work and resources happening within your organization. This allows you to make better-informed decisions on what tickets and projects take precedence, as well as what resources you can dedicate to each.
With resource capacity planning you get a big-picture view of your entire IT organization, allowing you to balance workloads across projects and support; and to see the different types of work that need to be done at any given time.
For example, if you have three IT technicians that need to cover three functional areas of business – like service, projects and operations – you can engage in resource capacity planning and optimize each technician’s workload based on their skill set and their availability. As a result, the work can be completed more effectively and efficiently as each technician is focused on work that plays to their strengths. And because you have a full view of the work and the time it will take; you can avoid overcommitting or underutilizing your resources.
This approach is especially useful when you have limited resources, but an increase in demand for support.
Unique to TeamDynamix is the ability to convert an incident or a problem into a project. As the case develops, you can convert your tickets to a project and assign a budget, timelines, and risk grades as required. This gives you a single view of your resources across both tickets and projects – and your end–users and technicians can see all their work in one spot.
There are many benefits to an organization when bringing ITSM and PPM together for proper resource capacity planning and, in general, transparency around tickets and projects, including:
To learn more about IT resource optimization and see how other organizations are using ITSM and PPM together check out:
This post was originally published in December 2022 and has been updated with new information.
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