It’s upgrade season at ServiceNow and all roads lead to Quebec.
Whether you're coming from Madrid, New York or Orlando, careful planning will help you avoid roadblocks and ensure success. If you’re not sure where to start, our checklist will guide you on your journey and ensure you reach your digital transformation destination.
Here are seven steps to upgrade to Quebec:
1. Clone your current instance
Nothing is worse than an upgrade that completely disrupts the business process. Cloning your current instance allows you to assess your upgrade readiness and address any issues or apply patches before upgrading without disrupting business processes.
2. Review the release notes.
You are probably excited to see what the new release has to offer anyway. Reviewing the release notes will give you an idea of exactly what is changing with the new release. You’ll get a sense how the changes associated with the upgrade will help you understand how these changes will impact your current processes.
3. Review upgrade best practices.
Compare the issues you need to address prior to upgrading to the release notes and come up with a list of best practices for the upgrade. Visit the Upgrade Center within ServiceNow’s Customer Service Center to get ServiceNow’s take on best practices to ensure success.
4. Run Automated Test Framework and User Acceptance Testing.
Automated Test Framework (ATF) will build out automated test cases. But even the most sophisticated machines don’t know everything. Run the automated test framework to identify potential problems and create a plan for mitigation.
User Acceptance Testing will help you understand how individual users may help you uncover problems that automated testing will overlook so you can mitigate those problems and the associated disruptions.
5. Analyze ATF data.
After running Automated Test Framework and User Acceptance Testing, analyze the data, ATF’s recommendations for mitigation and plan accordingly.
6. Review skipped records.
Analyze skipped records and apply best practices for processing those records so you can apply key findings to future upgrades.
7. Develop your plan.
Compile your research and testing results to plan your upgrade.
Change Management Tips:
An upgrade is a big project – reviewing Organizational Change Management can help ensure success. Even after you’ve been through the BIG change of ServiceNow implementation, it helps to have your OCM ducks in a row. It’s still a change, after all.
- Obtain sponsorship
- Identify stakeholders
- Assess risk
- Establish timelines
- Allocate resources
- Provide timely and frequent communications
Communicate before, during and after any change. Even when you don’t think the change will affect end users. Organizations who are transparent about the changes they’re making, whether migrating to an entirely new platform or simply upgrading the outstanding platform you already have, find that they’re more successful with fewer disruptions.
Check in after the project is complete. Make sure everything is working according to plan and make changes if you need.
Don’t be shy about reaching out to your experts. With upgrade assistance from Crossfuze, you have experts at the ready and a playbook full of best practices at your fingertips. By calling in the experts, you can feel secure that your upgrade will unlock the capabilities you need.
To get started on your upgrade to Quebec, reach out to us at Letstalk@crossfuze.com.
