iET
®ITSM Enables Enhanced
Service Management
iET
®ITSM Enables Enhanced Service Management
Need for IT Service Management
The focus within the vast majority of large and medium-size companies has shifted from pioneering implementation of the latest technology to maximizing the return on IT investments.
The importance of quality IT service management is becoming ever more apparent, demanding clear focus and attention. A recognized and professional structure has emerged to support this:
ITIL. ITIL, the IT Infrastructure Library, is used around the world and delivers a host of benefits.
The ITIL framework integrates the strategic, the tactical, and the operational processes to align business and IT goals and to deliver and support IT services. Fully implemented, the enterprise ties the business requirement for IT capability directly to the processes and technology needed to support it. ITIL helps IT departments meet service level requirements, stabilizes or improves the quality of service, and demonstrates a sense of urgency when required.
ITIL and the ISO/IEC 20000
Close behind the development of ITIL, a standard specifically dedicated to IT service
management has started to emerge: BS15000. It, too, is being widely deployed and has become the ISO/IEC 20000 standard, officially released in December 2005.
Part 1 of ISO/IEC 20000 “promotes the adoption of an integrated process approach to effectively deliver managed services to meet the business and customer requirements.” It comprises ten sections: Scope, Terms and Definitions, Planning and Implementing Service Management,
Requirements for a Management System, Planning and Implementing New or Changed Services, Service Delivery, Relationship, Control, Resolution, and the Release Processes. Part 2 is a “code of practice” that describes the best practices for service management within the scope of ISO/IEC 20000-1.
Together, this set is the first global standard for IT service management and is fully compatible with and supportive of the ITIL framework. It will undoubtedly have a significant impact upon the whole ITSM landscape. Companies looking to outsource their IT in the future will pay attention to whether a service provider has achieved the ISO/IEC 20000 certification. While it will not
guarantee good service, it will establish the provider’s ability to demonstrate transparent processes.
This standard can also support IT departments that need to position themselves against the outsourcing of IT services, particularly large IT units. Aligning IT to ITIL will increase, now that this globally acknowledged standard has been officially released.
iET Solutions’ application iET ITSM supports companies in aligning IT to ITIL, improving service quality and efficiency, and achieving the ISO/IEC 20000 certification by providing the necessary
Optimize IT Service Management with iET ITSM
iET ITSM was built from the ground up specifically to support the ITIL best-practices framework, so it provides much richer support for the key ITIL support and delivery processes. It delivers fast and efficient service desk performance plus comprehensive problem management capabilities to enhance productivity and quality. The software allows management of change in large
organizations, such as enabling workflow that provides parallel or sequential approval processes driven by electronic signatures. A graphic representation of the configuration management database (CMDB) improves both front- and back-office operations by making it easy to visualize relationships between configuration items (CIs).
iET ITSM fully supports:
GIncident Management
GProblem Management
GChange Management
GRelease and Deployment Management
GService Asset and Configuration Management
GService Level Management
GAvailability Management
As part of their continuous improvement, companies have to analyze and optimize processes. iET Process Analyzer is the ideal instrument for monitoring service quality, weak point analysis, and process
optimization. This tool measures how effectively service processes operate by using performance indicators and data from the operational system iET ITSM.
The CMDB plays a critical role in IT service management by tracking the IT infrastructure through the change process and ensuring that the accurate information needed for all IT processes is available. Since traditional manual tracking methods require so much time to perform, they lack both depth and timeliness. With the solution set iET CMDB Discovery & Intelligence, iET Solutions provides the capability to automatically gather all information about the IT infrastructure to fill the CMDB and keep it actual and accurate over time. An intelligent interface provides business processes that reconcile differences between the CMDB and the live infrastructure.
iET Solutions' Risk and Security Management allows users to assess the areas where their business may be vulnerable, ensure the security of IT assets, and adhere to compliance policies and standards.
iET Mobile ITSM gives mobile workforces access to iET ITSM from their existing mobile devices, making it possible to handle service requests from anywhere and at anytime.
iET ITSM Enables Enhanced Service Management
Detailed information about iET Process Analyzer, iET CMDB Discovery and Intelligence, iET Risk and Security Management, and iET Mobile is available at: www.iet-solutions.com. This white paper describes iET ITSM in complete detail.
Incident Management
The iET ITSM incident management module allows service desk personnel to record an incident with a few clicks of the mouse and lets them create templates for the most common types of incidents. Depending on the person and the system where the incident occurs, the software automatically determines which account the incident is assigned to and checks for a service level
agreement (SLA). If an SLA exists, the system will formulate deadlines and provide alerts based on these deadlines. If no SLA exists, the software notifies the service desk to prevent the incident from being opened; alternatively, it provides personnel with the option to work on the incident, if appropriate.
When the incident is created, the software automatically configures a tabbed dashboard that puts at the user’s fingertips all the
information required to efficiently deliver service.
One section of the dashboard accesses the configuration management database to provide detailed information on the customer’s machines. This eliminates 50 percent of service desk time that is, according to IT analyst firm Gartner, spent gaining an understanding of the customer’s hardware and software configuration. Another section provides a hierarchical solution tree that offers a platform for organizing previously documented
incidents in a structure that makes it easy to match the current incident. Users can check off a box to propose a solution as a standard to be added to the tree, and this is routed to an expert for review.
The incident management dashboard also provides an overview of open problems. If the person working on the incident finds, for example, a downed server that
appears to be the cause, he or she can link the incident to that problem and then be notified of any changes in its status. iET ITSM automatically builds up a complete history of all actions, diaries, etc., for each incident.
Knowledge Management
iET Knowledge Management includes the ability to rank solutions, set expiration dates, categorize solutions by technical category, track related incidence and changes, and provide feedback on
Incident Management Benefits
G Higher process performance &
first call solution rate
G Less workload for the service desk
G Increased service quality
G Higher customer satisfaction
Request Fulfillment
In keeping with ITIL V3, iET ITSM users have a Request Fulfillment module to request any service offered by the IT department, such as ordering a new computer, booking a conference room, or setting up a shared mailbox. The Service Request Fulfillment module uses a 'shopping cart' metaphor that is familiar to users, and provides the IT department with a sophisticated back- end to manage the approval and fulfillment processes, allowing for the automatic creation of Configuration Items in the CMDB, Incidents, Changes and their corresponding workflows.
Problem Management
While the incident management function is responsible for resolving everyday incidents, problem management offers the potential for improvements in the overall IT environment. It can, for example, provide long-term improvements in performance by identifying the root cause of
recurring incidents and problems and implementing permanent solutions. By using this module, a problem manager can identify and document workarounds and known error definitions for
problems in the infrastructure; these are then seamlessly available for first-line service desk personnel for use in resolving incidents.
The problem management module also offers many of the features described previously, such as templates, schedules, access to the CMDB, access to related incidents and changes, etc. Another section of the dashboard allows the agent to look at all users that might be affected by a particular problem. Change requests can easily be initiated via the problem
management form. For example, if a group of laptops needs to be recalled due to a battery problem, a request for change can be placed.
iET ITSM Service Level Management
Once an IT organization has achieved operational stability and physical control of the
infrastructure, it can focus on the improvement of its business-aligned IT services through the service level management process.
Through an iterative process, IT and business managers agree on the definition of an IT service and its quality, then manage the achievement of the necessary IT capability to deliver the service at the agreed level of quality. The service level management module tracks agreements between the IT service organization and the business.
iET ITSM Enables Enhanced Service Management
Problem Management Benefits
G Lower incident rate via proactive problem management
G Efficient root cause analysis based on up-to-date CI data
G Increased knowledge transfer within the IT organization
Service Level Management Benefits
G Continuous monitoring &
improvement of all IT services
G Basis to charge for services
G Effective management of customer & supplier relationships
The module provides tools to track SLAs of virtually any level of complexity. For example, it can easily define that a standard incident reported on the second shift should be closed within one hour of the time it was reported. The dashboard in this module provides a detailed listing of the agreements and the underlying contracts with suppliers that support each agreement. As has already been described, this module integrates tightly with all other processes to provide all the information needed to both track these agreements and manage the process of living up to them.
Availability Management
The goal of availability management is to guarantee that IT can meet the performance levels in the service level agreement. Availability management measures the actual availability levels and takes steps to improve them if they are not within an acceptable range. If the service drops below the agreed threshold, alerts are automatically sent to the appropriate contacts.
When calculating the actual availability, iET ITSM considers whether these downtimes were planned or unplanned. Planned downtimes, such as arranged maintenance windows and service times, are not considered negatively. In iET ITSM, the effect of availability on configuration items (CIs) is divided into three categories:
No Impact
“No Impact” downtime occurs when the unavailability of the CIs has no effect on the service. For example if a printer is out of service, it may have no impact since alternative printers are available and can be used.
Potential Impact
There is a potential impact to availability when a particular CI is down, but there are backup-CIs. In this case, the possibility of a service loss exists if the backup CIs should also fail and/or if all CIs that support these services fall out.
Direct Impact
A direct impact on the services exists if the services can not be used. This is the case, for example, if the server on which the ERP system runs is temporarily unavailable.
Availability Management Benefits
G Track and manage downtimes of CIs and services with Incident, Problem and Change Management
G Measure and evaluate the actual availability of CIs or services
G Utilize deviations between the actual availability and the contractually guaranteed availability to determine next steps and escalation paths
iET ITSM Change Management and Release and Deployment Management
The iET ITSM change management module automates the process of implementing changes and can be configured to adapt to any company’s workflow. Certain changes may be performed without authorization, others may require approval by an advisory board, and yet others may
require IT management approval. iET ITSM change management offers the ability to develop a customized workflow for change approval that can include a combination of parallel and sequential processes. Each step can be confirmed by an electronic signature that meets regulatory requirements, such as the Sarbanes-Oxley Act, while avoiding the cost and time involved in maintaining paper forms.
The user can define templates that reduce the amount of effort required to record common changes such as adds, moves, and deletes. The software provides the ability to define action plans for changes, and standard plans can be attached to templates. For example, a plan for a move might involve changing network availability,
physically moving the customer, updating the CMDB, etc. Each step can be automatically assigned to a particular person or group and scheduled; then, as deadlines approach, alerts can be delivered to the person responsible for performing the action.
Through action plans, the IT organization can operate according to common playbooks. The change
management module manages the approval workflow and keeps track of who has approved the change. This module also provides access to problems associated with the change, relevant service contracts, related CIs, etc. After the change is implemented, the associated dashboard will continue to track open items relating to the affected service.
For managing highly complex changes that roll out across multiple physical locations or on multiple dates, iET ITSM’s release and deployment management capabilities offer a combination of benefits, including grouping and managing multiple changes under a single release, unifying the release approval workflow process, and associating multiple CIs to one or more dynamically created change request. In addition, the release and deployment management module offers features that have been described above for other modules, such as templates, approval
workflow, and action schedules (the “release playbook”). This function provides the tools needed to plan, authorize, implement, and control large hardware and software rollouts.
iET ITSM Enables Enhanced Service Management
Change Management & Release and Deployment Management Benefits
G Risk assessment to minimize impact of changes on business processes
G Successful implementation of changes
G Shorter process runtimes
G Successful technology rollouts
CMDB Visualization Provides Benefits to all Functions
The graphic interface to the CMDB provided by iET ITSM makes it easy to visualize the relationships among
configuration items and displays the incidents, problems, changes, and releases that are connected to a CI. This graphic representation delivers significant advantages to each ITIL function, including more accurate diagnosis of problems through visualization of relationships between
seemingly unconnected incidents and more effective planning of changes through a high- level understanding of the connections between different elements of the IT infrastructure.
Trend Analysis
One of the most important functions of problem management is the ability to
proactively identify and solve possible incidents before the user even notices. With iET Process Analyzer, iET Solutions provides the ideal tool to perform trend analysis and identify recurring patterns. iET Process Analyzer is fully integrated and operates based on actual data out of iET ITSM. A variety of key performance indicators and standard analysis is shipped with the product.
Architecture
iET ITSM is built on the highly flexible iET Enterprise Solution Platform, empowering companies to easily adapt to unique requirements. This platform is unparalleled in its ability to quickly implement business rules that automate any type of business process. iET ITSM simplifies any customization process which may be needed to adapt to the specific requirements of most IT organizations. It does this by providing the iET Developer’s studio, which enables customization of nearly every element of the program, including forms and workflow, from a graphic
environment. This environment reduces the specialized skills required for customization, making it possible for nearly all IT organizations to roll out the program quickly and inexpensively and to modify it continually to meet changing requirements. These changes are implemented in an application layer so that the underlying technology can be upgraded without having any impact on the changes.
Multi-Entity Support
iET ITSM provides multi-entity support that allows companies to store and manipulate data belonging to different customers separated from each other in the database. This serves organizations that have sensitivity around certain types of customer data, such as that from government agencies, healthcare organizations, outsourcing providers, etc. The integrated account and account contact management administers the maintenance of all customer, contact, partner, and supplier data. It also captures locations and hierarchies.
Service Asset and Configuration Management Benefits
G Foresee the impact of configuration
G View relationships between CIs
G Reconciliation between CMDB
& actual IT infrastructure
G More efficiently manage change
G Lifecycle management of CIs
iET ITSM Enables Enhanced Service Management
SLA Timeline
The SLA Timeline sits at the top of the screen, depicting where a ticket (whether an Incident, a Problem or a Change) is in the resolution process and how much more time there is before the agreed time to resolution is met. A Service Desk representative can easily view and manage priorities, focusing on the more immediate tickets.
Dynamic Process Trail
Every time a user opens a form, runs a query, creates a document or launches Graphical
Explorer, a process trail is dynamically generated on the top of the screen. Now users can clearly see how they arrived at the current screen and which module of the application they are in, and navigate back and forth to review any steps in the process.
Self-Service
iET Weblink allows customers to deploy iET ITSM via Web browsers in intranets and extranets.
For employees, partners, and customers, a self-service portal can easily be built to provide full functionality. iET Weblink can also serve as an alternative client for remote offices or distributed subsidiaries.
Conclusion
iET ITSM combines fast and efficient service desk performance with comprehensive back-office management capabilities to enhance the pro-activity of the service management function. iET ITSM front-office functionality enhances the ability of the service desk to resolve incidents by putting information at reps’ fingertips and automating many administrative tasks. The back-office capabilities in ITSM provide a higher level of automation and transparency to problem, release, change, configuration, and service level management processes.
iET ITSM further distinguishes itself by its ability to be customized to fit any company’s service management business processes without the cost and lead time that have been required in the past to obtain this level of flexibility. The software package provides a complete
solution to the ITIL concept of aligning IT services in support of business objectives in order to maximize the return on IT investments.
About iET Solutions
iET Solutions develops, markets, and supports award-winning software applications for the IT service management market. Our ITSM suite is built around ITIL standards and has been verified by Pink Elephant, a world leader in ITSM education, to be compatible with core ITIL best practices.
For the purposes of process analysis, CMDB management, and risk and security management, iET Solutions offers integrated solutions. Over 600 customers in more than 26 countries worldwide benefit from iET Solutions' offerings.
Locations
Corporate Headquarters iET Solutions, LLC 959 Concord Street Framingham, MA 01701, USA Telephone: 508-416-9010 Fax: 508-416-9008 sales@iet-solutions.com www.iet-solutions.com
European Headquarters iET Solutions GmbH Boschetsrieder Straße 67 81379 Muenchen, Germany Telephone: + 49 89 74 85 89 0 Fax: +49 89 74 85 89 20 info@iet-solutions.de
® 2008 iET Solutions. All right reserved. iET® and the iET Solutions logo are Registered Trademarks of iET Solutions, LLC. All other brands or products are trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective holders and should be treated as such.