Call for Papers
Driving Real Value
"Yes – but here in the real world ....".How often have you heard that said – not just in a social context, but in your business life too?Building on the successes of the itSMF conferences over the last few years, the theme for Birmingham 2008 is
'Driving Real Value'.
The 2008 Conference is the ideal opportunity to learn what others have done – "in the real world", not just the theory, and to tell us what progress you have made, not forgetting the pitfalls you may have encountered along the way. Anything and everything relevant to Service Management is welcome.
In the last couple of years our early announcement of the Conference theme and streams has been well received by our members and helped prospective presenters to focus their efforts. By popular request we have done the same this year and now issue this Call for Papers for the following 'Driving Real Value' Conference streams:
1.Real Life Stories – the most popular sessions at our Conference still seem to be the "war stories" and (mis)adventures of our members in trying to champion Best Practice; Service Management in their organisations or in implementing processes. We all want to learn from others' mistakes and see how they (you?) have triumphed over adversity. And it's sometimes reassuring to find someone worse off than we are! Success or failure, highs and lows, if you have a story to tell or tips to pass on, we want to hear it – and so will a great many of the delegates at the Conference. We want to applaud your achievements - or share your pain! As always, preference in this stream will be given to user organisations or vendor members in conjunction with their customer partner – though in the latter case, please also refer to the "Real Partnerships" stream, which may be more appropriate.
2.Real Solutions – in contrast, this stream is primarily aimed at our vendor members (and users who are brave enough) to enable them to showcase proven "solutions". Not just the "real life story" but a more comprehensive account of combining process, people, tools and partners to deliver quantifiable benefits to an organisation. Tool demonstrations, exercises or workshops supported by real benefits, delivered to real customers. Showcase the solution here, sell it on your stand in the exhibition. Longer, more interactive sessions are the norm and offer a great opportunity for vendors to reach a receptive audience.
3.Real People – People and Culture, introduced as a full stream at the 2006 Conference, has proved so successful that it now rivals Real Life Stories as a "must" for every delegate to attend at least one session. This is the "softer" (i.e. less technical) side of change, which is often mismanaged and just as often has unforeseen impact. Best practice tells us to consider Process, Partners, Product and People in our implementation; all too often the people issues are overlooked or underplayed. Have you instituted special training programmes alongside the processes? How did you handle awareness? How do you suggest overcoming cultural issues like resistance to change or huge egos in your service improvement initiatives? We would like to hear about it.
4.Real Challenges –is a stream to focus on the BIG challenges that you (and perhaps we all) face. Unlike (most) Real Life Stories, these challenges may not have a happy ending or even an ending at all – yet. What particular challenges do you envisage as likely to occur in Service Management generally in the next year or two? What do we need to be aware of and plan ahead for? What, for example, are the main issues you are facing in adopting and adapting ITIL® V3? Tell us about your organisation's particular challenges, or those of your market sector, or maybe your crystal ball is better than ours!
5.Real Partnerships – another new stream for 2008. The word "partnership" can be interpreted however you wish – from perhaps a couple of people or internal departments who had not worked together before, joining forces for a successful Service Management implementation, to the other extreme of say a successful (or even unsuccessful!) outsourcing initiative. It is of course an ideal opportunity for a joint vendor/customer partner submission, and can also be used to illustrate the lessons learned when a partnership initiative did not work effectively for some reason.
6. Interactive Sessions - We have received very positive feedback regarding the running of the Interactive Learning sessions at the Conference and this year we would like to open up this area to cover a wider remit than simulation games based on implementing ITIL. The Events Committee would be interested in hearing from organisations (end user or vendor) about any Interactive Sessions that they would like to run during the Conference. The sessions would need to be able to accommodate at least 50 people. In order to qualify, you will need to submit a paper and any brochures or slides outlining the session and how you would propose to run it. All submissions should be made via the Call for Papers process.
Please click on the following link to submit your paper:
Call for Papers Submission 2008
Submissions must be received by 11th April 2008 at the latest and must contain the following information:
Title of Session: 10 words maximum
Synopsis: To cover the main thrust of the presentation (50 - 100 words)
Target audience: An indication of the type of attendee that the presentation is aimed at should be included, such as Director, Manager, Practitioner or Foundation level. For example you may say "This presentation would be beneficial to Service Managers or people attempting to implement or improve Change Management".
Stream: one of the six noted above.
Brief Speaker Profile(s): a potted biography which prospective attendees will use with the synopsis to decide the relevance to them of your proposed presentation. The emphasis is though on the word "brief".
Duration: the standard is 40 minutes but the "Real Solutions" stream will allow longer sessions up to 90 minutes.
Though we are usually oversubscribed many times over with potential presentations, we welcome submissions from everyone; don't be deterred if you have never spoken at an itSMF event or even in public before. Your submission will be judged on its merits and relevance, just like those from experienced presenters.
Please be aware that in our quest for continual improvement, we have introduced an additional shortlisting stage this year. As noted earlier, the initial pass or "longlisting" will be based on the submissions. Those prospective presenters who pass this stage will be informed by 1st May and must then submit draft slides of their proposed presentation by
19th May. This is not expected to be the final version of your presentation, but needs to be sufficient for the Events Committee panel to compare the various submissions and reduce the long list to a final shortlist. You may therefore wish to start thinking about a first draft of your proposed presentation or interactive session when you prepare your submission.
Prospective presenters who have been selected to present at the Birmingham 2008 Conference will be informed early in June; from then on the usual "buddy" role in supporting speakers will take effect. The "buddying" skills of the Events Committee members are invaluable to speakers (even experienced ones) and we strongly advise those of you who are chosen to speak to make contact as soon as you are informed who your buddy will be. Presenters will be provided with more details of "buddying" in due course.
