"IT Services" – nowadays, we can actually imagine everything under this term...
...that has something to do with a few zeros and ones, whereas this term is an essential element for the running business of most companies.
In the past, IT services were primary related to the installation and configuration of hardware and software, today the services in IT field are more concerned with a variety of advisory and consultancy services with higher added value. Whereas in the 90-th years of the last century, investment in hardware and licenses accounted for approximately 80% of IT costs and only 20% was allocated to IT services, today this ratio is the opposite.
The main question of current IT market is not what can be included into IT services, but what can be expected from IT services, and especially, what end-users of IT can expect from it. Is it a group of service desk services, project management, business process optimization or an availability of e-mail server? Finding a definite answer to this question is difficult, because of the requirements for IT services are very different nowadays- an assistant has different requirements for IT services as an administrator of the corporate IT infrastructure or CEO. The most important is the fact that IT must fully support the business activities of the organization, because any part of the organization executive cannot work without the IT.
In combination with the constant pressure from IT vendors and the recommendations about of the rapid return on investments of their products and services, companies often raise the question - what they really need from IT and its services, what they expect from the information technologies and what they are willing to pay for it in order to meet their business objectives.
One of the ways, how an individual or the whole company do not lose in various IT technologies and services provided by the internal IT department whether external suppliers, is to introduce automated and mainly process-oriented IT Service Management. There are more approaches to IT Service Management in the market, from widely known and accepted approaches and methodologies such as ITIL, COBIT, CMMI, Six Sigma, to individually selected and introduced "no-name" methodologies used in smaller organizations. However, it should be noted that neither respected methods is not a panacea for all IT illness, but only a way to streamline processes of IT services providing to enable a balance between the users requirements and demand of managers and the whole IT.
The universal way, how to clarify and streamline the flow of IT services, is also considered the well-known methodology based on best practices not only from the IT environment - ITIL (IT Infrastructure Library), widely recognized as an unwritten standard of IT Service Management. However, after the initial euphoria and the wide evangelization in previous years has come a disillusionment and finding that the spread ITIL introduction is not suitable for every organization, it has turned out that the implementation of IT service management according to this methodology can greatly streamline the IT functions and optimize the whole IT.
The failure reasons of IT Service Management implementation using ITIL framework can be countless, from excessive expectations (ITIL implementation is a long-term issue, that means, the results are not immediately visible), through the extensive requirements on internal processed changes, complexity of implementation, poor connection between services and business processes. Currently the connection between IT and business is a key element of the implementation of optimal IT services management, especially when we consider that the IT has another priority in manufacturing company, bank or electronic commerce.
In practice, Business Service Management (BSM) covers the alignment and integration of key IT services and business. Its mission is to enable IT to respond rapidly to constantly changing business environment. BSM provides a strong support in decision-making during the development, implementation and support of IT services, based on business indicators of the company, such as the real costs of IT services vs. particular future expected economic benefits.
It is possible to identify the critical IT services that are necessary for the business operations by this approach. On the one hand, when we express it in economic terms, the direct costs of providing specific services has not any longer created the black hole from IT budget and IT has become a departure that generate some added value. On the other hand, BSM helps to eliminate services providing the same or similar functionality, including the services that are "in circulation" for various historical reasons and do not accomplish the minimum technical and operational objectives that the organization can focus on services providing higher added value.
The BSM, in contrast to traditional IT service management based on managing the technical components of IT infrastructure, approaches to IT as a package. The services management as a whole is much more complex and requires cooperation of multiple technology components to be able to provide the required business outcomes, i.e. IT services within a clearly defined standard, quality and scope. Therefore, the basis for successful BSM implementation to the structure of the organization is known as triangle People – Processes – Technology supporting the IT service management over the entire life cycle. Each IT service from the business perspective has its own life cycle, whether it is the preparation of reports, emails, or the processing of payroll and attendance, which must be clearly defined, easy-to-implement, variable depending on current needs and, of course, clear, measurable and reportable. All these tasks are interrelated and supported the various ITIL processes (Fig. 1).
Key stages of the IT services life cycle, supported and managed by BSM are:
• Request & Support - allows you to simplify and automate processes for the establishment, change and business support services, creating a stable environment through a single process model and a streamlining of the IT department productivity.
• Provision & Configure - consistently implements business services across IT infrastructure by introducing a unique architecture, which will ultimately accelerate the introduction and delivery of new services and reduce the risk of implementing changes within the IT.
• Monitor & Operate - proactively identifies and resolves IT problems before escalating and threatening of the service providing for internal, respectively external customer.
• Plan & Govern - supports the planning, management and IT management in accordance with the standards, best practices and security policies to increase the transparency and IT costs usage and evaluate the real success of individual IT projects.
• Integrate & Orchestra - at this stage there is identification, visualization and organization of business services by integrating data and business processes into efficient enterprise-wide workflow, including the definition and automation of repeatable IT processes.
Targeted and well transferred to the organization BSM implementation can save considerable funds, particularly for change management and technical support, particularly by eliminating a needless work and automating the processes. However, Business Service Management is not only about the harmonization of IT services with business objectives, but mainly about the overall streamlining of business processes in relation to IT and the ability to bring together information across the whole organization for the purpose of providing the best services for customers.
Fig. 1 Processes and Functions of Business Service Management – BluePrintTM
Wrote: Ing. Juraj Pavol, Product & Account Manager, QBSW, a.s. Published in Infoware No 6/2010.
(31.05.2010)
