ITSM (IT Service Management)

• Abstrak

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.

• Introduction

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 today's 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	è	Process focus
"Fire-fighting"	è	Preventative
Reactive	è	Proactive
Users	è	Customers
Centralized, done in-house	è	Distributed, sourced
Isolated, silos	è	Integrated, enterprise-wide
"One off", adhoc	è	Repeatable, accountable
Informal processes	è	Formal best practices
IT internal perspective	è	Business perspective
Operational specific	è	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

Difference between ITMS & ITIL

ITSM is an acronym for IT service management. It simply means how you manage the information systems that deliver value to your customers. Even if you’ve never heard the term ITSM, if you’re running IT systems, then you are doing ITSM. ITSM could include activities like planning and managing changes so they don’t cause disruption to the business, fixing things when they go wrong, or managing a budget to ensure you can pay the bills when they arrive. People who use the term ITSM tend to think of IT as a means of delivering valuable services to their customers, rather than as a way to manage technology—but even if you have a completely technical focus, your work still needs to be managed, and that’s what we call ITSM.

ITIL is the name of the world’s most widely recognized framework for ITSM. ITIL is a registered trademark of AXELOS, which owns a range of best practice solutions and their corresponding publications and exams. ITIL has been adopted by many organizations, and there are millions of certified ITIL practitioners worldwide.

• Discussion

ITSM (IT Service Management)

ITSM has a number of definitions, available from a variety of sources. Let’s start with the ITIL (the ITSM best practice framework formerly known as the IT Infrastructure Library – more on this later) definition:

“The implementation and management of quality IT services that meet the needs of the business. IT service management is performed by IT service providers through an appropriate mix of people, process and information technology. See also service management.”

Source: ITIL 2011 Glossary

ITIL also defines service management as:

“A set of specialized organizational capabilities for providing value to customers in the form of services.”

A more customer-focused definition of ITSM was previously listed on Wikipedia, but is now no longer available:

“A discipline for managing information technology (IT) systems, philosophically centered on the customer's perspective of IT's contribution to the business. ITSM stands in deliberate contrast to technology-centered approaches to IT management and business interaction.”

Original source: Wikipedia

A completely different definition – and this time of “service management applied to IT” – is from The Universal Service Management Body of Knowledge (USMBOK) – a series of publications and references for professionals working in service provider organizations that supplements existing resources, such as ITIL, on both strategic and operational levels:

“Also termed service management thinking, service management is a systematic method for managing the offering, contracting and provisioning of services to customers, at a known quality, cost and designed experience. Service management ensures the desired results and customer satisfaction levels are achieved cost effectively, and is a means by which the customer experience and interaction with products, services, and the service provider organization is designed and managed. Service management is also a transformation method for any organization that wishes to operate as a service provider organization.”

Source: USMBOK

So, in layman’s terms, ITSM is about:

Customers

Services

Quality

Cost

Meeting business needs

All this goes way beyond the traditional view of managing IT based on siloed technology domains such as network, storage, and compute; ITSM is about optimizing service delivery and the consumption of those IT services.

Popular ITSM frameworks For example:

COBIT - a framework for developing, implementing, monitoring and improving information technology (IT) governance and management practices. The COBIT framework is published by the IT Governance Institute and the Information Systems Audit and Control Association (ISACA).

Microsoft Operations Framework - a series of 23 documents that guide IT professionals through the processes of creating, implementing and managing efficient and cost-effective services. Like ITIL, MOF includes guidelines for the entire lifecycle of an IT service, from concept to retirement or replacement.

Six Sigma - a management framework developed by Motorola. The framework emphasizes setting extremely high objectives, collecting data, and analyzing results to a fine degree as a way to reduce defects in products and services.

SO 20000 - a global standard that describes the requirements for an ITSM system. Although the standard was developed by developed by the British Standards Institutions to mirror best practices described within the ITIL framework, it also supports other frameworks, such as Microsoft's Operations Framework.

TOGAF (The Open Group Architecture Framework) - provides a structured approach for organizations seeking to organize and govern their implementation of technology, particularly software technology.
TOGAF was created and is maintained by The Open Group, an independent industry association.

ITIL (Information Technology Infrastructure Library) - a framework that provides best practices for aligning IT with business needs. The most widely used framework for IT process management is ITIL v3, which has five parts: Strategy, Design, Transition, Operations and Continual Service Improvement. Ongoing development for ITIL has been vested in Axelos, a joint-venture company created by the U.K. Cabinet Office and Capita PLC. As of this writing, the most widely used framework for ITSM is ITIL v3. ITIL was created because there was a need for ITSM best practice in the late 1980’s and it has since become the de facto framework used by many organizations across the world. The framework has five parts: Strategy, Design, Transition, Operations and Continual Service Improvement.

 

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 organization's 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:

1.    Determine the current, existing IT infrastructure, processes, and services

2.    Develop some desired future state of IT and the services that it needs to provide

3.    Architect a "roadmap" that depicts how to get to the desired state from the current state

4.    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 organization's 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

• conclusion

If you run IT services, you owe it to your customers to adopt ideas that will make you effective, efficient, and agile. So maybe it’s time you had another look at ITIL to see what it has to offer , ITSM will reduce the cost of operations. That means fewer servers, fewer licenses, fewer assets to manage, and lower maintenance costs. It also means freedom from lock-in to any particular vendor. With greater access comes greater flexibility. When IT is flexible, businesses have more agility and existing information and even services can be used in different contexts.

 Refrensi

http://searchitoperations.techtarget.com/definition/ITSM

https://www.sysaid.com/resources/what-is-itsm

http://www.itsm.info/ITSM.htm

http://www.villanovau.com/resources/itil/itsm-lifecycle-stages/#.V1P08JF97IV

http://www.simplilearn.com/itsm-general-framework-and-implementation-rar291-article

http://www.bmc.com/blogs/itsm-or-itil-that-isnt-the-question/

http://blogs.forrester.com/stephen_mann/12-03-30-defining_it_service_management_or_is_that_service_management

http://helpdesksolutions.com.au/Products/LANDeskITServiceManagement/WhyYouNeedITSM/tabid/66/Default.aspx

http://cloudtweaks.com/2014/02/need-itsm-onboard-take-cloud/