It’s interesting that when you do reviews of IT departments for clients that many attempt to reinvent the wheel, or service management framework if you will, despite the fact that said wheel has been in stable production for some time now and if the plans were bought off the shelf the result would be within expected bounds. Although frameworks such as ITIL have their critics (particularly related to being bureacratic bloated bastardry at its best), at least they are a framework that works and deliver reliable results.
I would suggest that if an IT department doesn’t adopt a service management framework (ITIL or its competitors) then you’ll need to spend a lot of time developing a framework without the benefit of others’ experience – to the detriment of service delivery, firstly, and more than likely strategic focus in the medium term.
It is after all kind of difficult to establish a strategic vision if you’re busy doing work that other people have already done.