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ITSM (ISO 20000-1)

ISO  20000-1

ISO IEC 20000-1  is an Information Technology Service Management

Overview

ITSM employs ITIL documented best practices and in most cases extends beyond into additional areas such as enhanced processes and implementation to provide additional value-added functionality. At present, ITSM methods have evolved to include specific ways to enable and optimize assessment, planning, and implementation of ITIL best practices.

Background

One primary origin of ITSM can be found in the systems management services and functions historically done in large scale mainframe environments. Through constant refinement over the years these services and functions attained a high level of maturity. Problem and change management, configuration management, capacity planning, performance management, disaster recovery, availability management, etc. are some examples.

When examining the differences between mainframe systems management services and ITSM, it becomes apparent that when ITSM is applied in todays IT environment and across the enterprise the benefits and sophistication of its best practices are highlighted and exemplified. Where mainframe environments are typically centralized, ITSM is applicable to both distributed and centralized environments. In addition, where mainframe services are typically stand-alone and technology based, ITSM provides for integrated services that are process based with a focus on satisfying business requirements.

Although managing the technology itself is a necessary component of most ITSM solutions, it is not a primary focus. Instead ITSM addresses the need to align the delivery of IT services closely with the needs of the business. This transformation of a traditional "business - IT paradigm" can be depicted by some of the following attributes:

Traditional I/T                                                  becomes                               ITSM Process

 Technology focus                                                        -                                               Process focus

"Fire-fighting"                                                             -                                               Preventative

Reactive                                                                                  -                                               Proactive

Users                                                                           -                                               Customers

Centralized, done in-house                             -                                               Distributed, sourced

Isolated, silos                                                              -                                               Integrated, enterprise-wide

"One off", adhoc                                                         -                                               Repeatable, accountable

Informal processes                                                      -                                               Formal best practices

IT internal perspective                                                -                                               Business perspective

Operational specific                                                    -                                               Service orientation

Business objectives, service level objectives, technology infrastructure and other areas play critical roles in any ITSM method paradigm and are presented and discussed in detail in ITSM Services

ITSM General Methodology

ITSM and ITIL upon which it is based are both an integrated, process based, set of best practices to manage IT services. Whereas ITIL defines and documents the best practices, ITSM employs them to meet unique customer requirements and priorities.

ITSM methodology encompasses the following areas (the basic areas of ITIL):

IT Service Support

Configuration Management - physical and logical perspective of the IT infrastructure and the IT services being provided

Change Management - standard methods and procedures for effective managing of all changes

Release Management - testing, verification, and release of changes to the IT environment

Incident Management - the day-to-day process that restores normal acceptable service with a minimal impact on business

Problem Management - the diagnosis of the root causes of incidents in an effort to proactively eliminate and manage them

Service Desk (Function) - a function not a process, this provides a central point of contact between users and IT

IT Service Delivery

Availability Management - optimize IT infrastructure capabilities, services, and support to minimize service outages and provide sustained levels of service to meet business requirements

IT Service Continuity - managing an organizations capability to provide the necessary level of service following an interruption of service

Capacity Management - enables an organization to tactically manage resources and strategically plan for future resource requirements

Service Level Management - maintain and improve the level of service to the organization

Financial Management for IT Services - managing the costs associated with providing the organization with the resources needed to meet requirements

Depending on the ITSM consulting methodology that is employed, additional value-added areas can be included. These areas could be separate but dependent on those listed above, such as Print and Output Management, or they could be sub-processes of those listed above, such as IT Strategy Development.

ITSM General Implementation

A typical high level overview of an ITSM implementation structure encompasses the following:

    Determine the current, existing IT infrastructure, processes, and services
    Develop some desired future state of IT and the services that it needs to provide
    Architect a "roadmap" that depicts how to get to the desired state from the current state
    Determine the steps needed to execute the "roadmap"

The ITSM implementation framework for each of the IT Service Delivery and Service Support areas listed above is a 5 phase model:

Assessment - determine the current state and begin to collect and understand the metrics for the future desired state

Architect and Design - develop a mature design for the future desired state

Planning - develop those plans necessary to achieve the future desired state in a phased evolutionary fashion

Implementation - implement and deploy the plans within IT and across the enterprise to achieve the future desired state

Support - manage, maintain, and improve the future desired state being able to adaptively integrate enhancements as needed or required

Within this framework, effectively managing IT as an enterprise wide, service oriented entity typically comprises one or more of the following separate and distinct perspectives:

People - quantity and quality of expertise and knowledge

Process - IT and organization specific practices, procedures, guidelines, etc. and the level of complexity and sophistication of them

Technology - total logical and physical technology infrastructure consisting of hardware, software, communication networks, applications, DBMS, etc.

Organization - internal and external business factors that affect IT, how IT and the organization interface, what is the organizations "corporate culture", what are the organizations direction and how does that affect IT

Integration - how is IT integrated within the business model, what services does IT provide, how are the services provided, and how are best practices employed within IT
 

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