The Ops4Less model of IT Operations cost control:
P A I D ™
People
Get the right people, get the people right
□ Recruitment
□ Culture
□ Motivation
□ Evaluation
Activity
Do the right things, do things right
□ Planning
□ Process
□ Measurement
□ Improvement
Investment
Spend to save money, save money on spending
□ Technology
□ Services
□ Suppliers
□ Projects
Dealing
Manage the business, the business of managing money
□ Funding
□ Service
□ Outsourcing
□ Revenue
Made in New Zealand 
Comments
Good Piece!
I live this everyday I go to work. I am the Incident/Crisis Manager for a national company who hired me specifically to bring ITIL based Incident Management into their organization. Having a background in supporting users and dealing with technologists on the back-end to resolve incidents, I can tell you that there is no better solution to incidents than a defined process and an logical, clear, benefit-focused explanation behind those processes to make light-bulbs begin to go off and buy-in to start happening.
When that moment of Zen occurs and the benefit begins to become realized then that motivation spreads and focus on the technology begins to take off. At work I have been called the "evangelist" because I am selling the methodology in the same manner you outline above. Motivate the people and you can accomplish anything. Give them the roadmap and they will get you there faster.
Sometimes as the implementer, you have to dive into the forest and introduce the trees.