Defining the optimal level of business benefits within IS/IT projects: Insights from benefit identification practices adopted in an IT Service Management (ITSM) project

The popularity of benefit realization management (BRM) in today’s IT-enabled world is fast gaining traction within IT organisations around the world. However, there appears to be limited attention paid to the intra-organisational practice by which benefits are identified. The purpose of this paper is twofold: firstly, to describe and define a practice approach that reflects the ongoing organisational investment through a benefit identification process that serves to exploit a number of benefit identification methods. Secondly, to underline and reflect on the importance of this benefit identification process in the context of IT service management (ITSM). This is achieved through a case study of an information technology infrastructure library (ITIL) implementation in a multinational organization. The case study exposes a pragmatic practice approach of customising such implementations in an effort to achieve a cost effective implementation of IT services that reflects the context and requirements of that specific organisation.