The moment a ServiceNow platform goes live is often celebrated as a success. But for many organizations, it marks the point where value begins to drift.
According to John Asquith, ServiceNow lead at consulting and implementation partner Klarus, organizations frequently confuse technical success with business impact. This, he told NowBen, creates a persistent gap between deployment and value.
“The gap almost always appears after go-live rather than during implementation itself. Most organizations define success at the point where the platform is live, stable, and technically functioning as expected… but business value is not created at that moment.”
Illusion of Success
ServiceNow’s own research highlights similar challenges, with organizations reporting “slow value realization due to slow adoption” and ongoing difficulty in measuring the business impact of tech investments.
That aligns with what Asquith sees in practice with customers. Many organizations implement ServiceNow successfully from a delivery standpoint – but fail to rethink how work gets done. So rather than redesigning processes, they digitize what already exists.
“When existing processes are lifted and shifted into ServiceNow without being fundamentally reviewed… the outcome is often a solution that deals with the documented process, but ignores the… workarounds that actually enable things to get done,” he explained.
The result is that employees continue to rely on informal processes such as email, spreadsheets, and side conversations to fill the gaps.
“Teams try to continue operating in the same way, only now through a different interface… and bypass the system if their previous workaround is not supported.”
When the Platform Stalls
Over time, that misalignment shows up in how ServiceNow is actually used, said Asquith. In many cases, it remains confined to IT, never evolving into the enterprise-wide workflow platform it was intended to be.
“One of the most common signs of underutilization is that ServiceNow remains confined to IT, rather than being adopted as a broader enterprise platform.”
Even where adoption spreads, deeper issues often persist. Automation capabilities go underused, while trust in data begins to erode, further undermining adoption.
“When teams don’t trust the data in ServiceNow, they stop contributing to it… which can accelerate the drift back to shadow tools and informal processes,” said Asquith, noting at which point the platform risks becoming little more than a reporting layer.
“When ServiceNow is being used to record what has already happened instead of using AI to shape what should happen next, it is a clear sign that its value is not being fully realised.”
The truth is that across digital transformation programs, the biggest barriers to value are rarely technical. They are organizational, spanning governance, ownership, and change management.
This is echoed by industry analysis of the ServiceNow ecosystem, where consulting and advisory services are increasingly positioned around value realization and adoption, rather than just implementation.
“Value is created when systems, data, and ways of working are aligned – not when technology is deployed in isolation,” said Asquith.
Stuck in the IT Silo
So, what’s the answer? One of the biggest structural barriers is how ServiceNow is introduced in the first place. Most organizations start with IT service management – but never fully move beyond it.
“ServiceNow is typically introduced at an operational level and remains there… it often starts within IT… and that anchors the platform within a narrow part of the organization,” said Asquith.
Breaking demands a shift in ownership, positioning, and intent, he continued.
“To become strategic, ServiceNow needs to be repositioned as an enterprise-wide workflow and service management platform. Repositioning a platform that started in IT as an enterprise-wide asset requires political will as much as technical planning.
“Unlocking strategic value is less about doing more with the platform and more about using it with greater intent and alignment.”
The Leadership Gap
If process redesign is one missing piece, leadership alignment is another. Without a shared vision for what the platform is meant to achieve, organizations struggle to prioritise use cases or scale success, said Asquith.
“Without alignment at the leadership level, different parts of the organization tend to optimize for their own priorities,” he said.
At the same time, many organizations fail to treat ServiceNow as a long-term capability, instead approaching it as a one-off project.
“ServiceNow is not a one-off implementation; it is a capability that evolves over time.”
Final Thoughts
“Organizations need to be clear on what they are trying to achieve… Without that clarity, it is difficult to prioritize or measure impact,” maintained Asquith.
From there, the focus shifts to end-to-end workflows, governance, and adoption – with an emphasis on demonstrating value early. “In our experience, early wins do more to drive adoption than any communication campaign,” he added.
Ultimately, the issue isn’t ServiceNow’s ability to deliver value, but whether organizations are set up to realize it.