That’s the opening bombshell from the ServiceDesk & IT Support show (SDITS) which started today at Earls Court.   Introducing a breakfast briefing based based on the whitepaper: Empowering People on the Move, Tony Probert of Cherwell explained that the traditional IT service desk must become a more dynamic entity driven by business demands.  “If the service desk just delivers IT break/fix, it’s an easy decision to save costs by outsourcing it.  We should be talking about business service management, so much so that we will drop the ‘IT’ from IT service management soon.”

The challenge was underlined by findings of the joint Cherwell and Service Desk Institute (SDI) study, which showed that while 94 per cent of organisations offer support for mobile devices, just 47 per cent extend the service to user-owned technologies.  Almost two-thirds of service desks are being asked to support mobile even though they feel ill-equipped to do so.

The discussion soon turned to another hot topic: social media – with several audience members still pursuing the line of blocking these technologies.  “People fight for tools which help them work.  We battled to get more desktops, then laptops, then internet access, then Blackberrys; it’s futile to block social media.  Would you ban the Sun newspaper on the grounds that staff may waste time reading it?  If people abuse the privilege of having the phone, then we act – social media is no different,” argued Stephen Mann of Forrester.

The SDI’s Howard Kendall agreed that IT cannot afford to block technology.  “The workforce is getting younger, SME’s and start-ups are full of dynamic, young people, and the corporate world doesn’t reflect that yet.  The service desk in its current form is dead, but there will always be the need for human support because this is what people ultimately like.”

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