All processes at a glance: IT Services at Hamburger Sparkasse
In 2027, Hamburger Sparkasse will celebrate its 200th anniversary. While accountants, clerks, and messengers were once essential, today it's all about workflows and optimized processes. To ensure day-to-day business runs smoothly, the Hamburg-based bank relies on the ITSM system from KIX Service Software.
Initial situation
Hamburger Sparkasse, or Haspa for short, is Germany's largest savings bank, boasting total assets of €57 billion. Its more than 4,400 employees serve over 1.5 million private and corporate customers in approximately 100 branches. Haspa is one of the largest private employers in northern Germany, as well as one of the largest training companies, with almost 200 trainees.
In such a large company, the demands on IT are enormous. Small mistakes can quickly cause major problems. Therefore, all activities must be documented for every change — from the request to the review, approval, and implementation. "We have a large number of employees, numerous queues, and almost every order involves additional subcontracts. To keep track of everything, it is important that everyone involved can follow every step," says Andreas Hehmann, Haspa's IT strategy and architecture expert.
Smooth transition to the Elbe
Since October 2022, Haspa has been working with the IT service management software KIX. However, the switch was not entirely voluntary at first. In early 2022, Hehmann and his team learned that the contract with the previous solution's service provider would not be renewed at the end of the year. They needed to find a replacement quickly. KIX proved to be a perfect fit for Hehmann and his team. "Many people find it difficult to adapt to change. Thanks to the open-source principle, the transition to KIX was super easy. We adapted the dashboard and processes so that everything looks and works almost the same as with the previous solution. We now have more options for documentation than we did with our last provider," says Hehmann.
To outsiders, Haspa's processes may seem overly detailed, but the approach has proven effective. When an order is received by the IT department, it first goes to IT requirements management, where it is checked and forwarded. After the order is assigned, planning begins, followed by evaluation by the ITSM team. Implementation and documentation only begin once the team approves the order. This process covers everything from installation orders and activations to change processes.
Who, how, what, why?
"For us, it's not just about what is done, but also about 'who' and 'why,'" explains Andreas Hehmann. "Even with seemingly minor tasks that can be completed in just a few steps, we make sure we cover all our bases." A typical example is communicating with third-party companies. If Hehmann and his colleagues want to send attachments, they should not do so via email for traceability reasons, but rather via KIX. If the other company does not use KIX, however, the firewall must first be activated. The process then goes through all stages so that everyone involved is aware of every intermediate step and decision. It sounds complicated, but it's relatively quick.
Compared to the previous solution, KIX offers several advantages: All Haspa IT employees can document their activities in dynamic fields or with notes, making them available to all colleagues at any time. To help new colleagues get started with the processes, Andreas Hehmann and his team have created a tutorial with PowerPoint examples and a KIX manual. Additionally, the integrated KIX checklists have proven particularly helpful: "They're less about checking boxes and more about always having a guide at hand," explains Hehmann.
Much has already been achieved, but there is still more to come!
Haspa's IT team has been proceeding cautiously. Initially, only five to six processes were planned in KIX, but now 14 have been integrated into the system. There are likely to be more. Seventeen teams work with 19 different roles, which are managed via Active Directory. Since its introduction in October 2022, employees have created over 1,500 process tickets.
"For us, KIX is more of an order management system than a ticketing tool for mapping our core processes. We were impressed by how adaptable it is.”
Hehmann plans to leverage and expand these opportunities in the future. In addition to refining current processes, he intends to provide process support in departments lacking a central solution. KIX Connect will also simplify the integration of other ticket tools from external service providers. According to Andreas Hehmann, Haspa is only at the beginning of its IT transformation. “KIX offers so many possibilities that it would be a shame to use only a fraction of them. In any case, we are looking forward to the coming years.”
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