IT Service Transition – purpose and processes Yavor Ganchev

Today’s topics What is Service Transition Objectives of Service Transition Service Transition Processes

What is Service Transition Service transition makes sure that new or changed service satisfies the needs of customers and business expectations as documented in the service strategy and service design lifecycle stages. The transition lifecycle stage takes the overall care of transition part of an organization from one state to another, mean while delivering the capabilities for service operation and continual service improvement. The main aim of the transition stage is to plan and manage changes efficiently as well as effectively and at the same time controlling risks and delivering knowledge for decision support.

Service Transition Objectives  The objective of ITIL Service Transition is to build and deploy IT services. Service Transition also makes sure that changes to services and Service Management processes are carried out in a coordinated way. The main objectives of Transition are to: Efficiently and effectively plan and manage service changes: what is the cost, when should we do it, what infrastructure will be affected, what other services will be influenced? Manage change risks: What could go wrong? What are the odds? What will we do if it happens? Here we make sure that we address all possible failures and their adverse impacts on business. Release planned changes: We actually implement changes in operative infrastructure. Is the release tested properly? What resources will be utilized for this? Can we implement several changes at the same time? What can be released from the central location, and what releases have to be implemented on site? Manage expectations on new or changed services: We validate, test and evaluate changes. Manage accurate knowledge and info on changed services and assets: When we change something, is the knowledge about this change entered into the Configuration Management Database (CMDB) or Configuration Management System? All other stakeholders need to have accurate info about the new infrastructure state in order to be able to provide the service and support it. What I see as the main benefit of Service Transition is that we will be more confident that new/changed services will be delivered without unexpectedly affecting other services or stakeholders.

Change Management The key Transition process, and one of the key ITIL processes. Change is usually the main cause of a service disruption, so we want as much control over change as possible. In Change Management we ensure that all changes are provided with minimum downtime. Term: “Change Request” Term: “Change Advisory Board (CAB)” Term: “Change remediation” a.k.a. “Back out plan” Transition is a change and the most important area in Transition is managing the change, the process is called Change Management. Change management is a term that very often falls into controversies. Sometimes it's a victim, if the result is less than targeted: "That initiative failed because we didn't focus enough on change management." Not to forget at times it helps to gather eyeballs for project activities that might otherwise get overlooked: "Everything was possible because we implemented the new process; let's not forget about the change management." Change management is a process which assures that the changes which are taking place in the organization are monitored throughout the stages so that no scope of error is left unturned. It is a very organized approach to ensure that changes are implemented effectively and efficiently. The change can range from a simple process change to major things like policy and strategy changes. So change management is a very important term as well as process in Service Transition. Change request can take several forms: Request for Change (RFC) document A service desk call A project initiation document A change proposal for a strategic change (containing several RFCs) CAB – is a team of people that can authorize a change after discussion. It consists of technical and business people. The CAB members differ for each meeting, depending on the RFC to be discussed. ECAB – Emergency CAB.

Service Asset and Configuration Management The purpose of the SACM process is to make sure that the assets required to deliver services are properly controlled, and make sure that reliable and accurate information about these assets is available wherever and whenever it is required. This information also constitutes of details like the relationships between assets and how the assets have been configured. Term: “Configuration Item (CI)” Term: “Configuration Management Data Base (CMDB)” Term: “Configuration Management System (CMS)” A CI is any component or other service asset that needs to be managed in order to deliver an IT Service. Types of Cis include: IT Services, hardware, software, people, formal documentation as SLAs or process documentation, buildings and so on. Details regarding CI is called attributes. Example attributes: relevant SLA, physical location, ip address, contact person, first line resolution group, password. CMDB – Stores all the Cis with their attributes and relations between them. CMS – CMS, contains the CMDB and helps is manage it. Also contains other information like history of incidents, problems, known errors, changes made and so on.

Release and Deployment Management  In a nutshell, RDM deals with what Change Management decided to do, with the resources and timeframes available. Major, Minor, Emergency Releases Good planning Knowledge sharing Release and Deployment Management is a set of various strategies, key points, and techniques including: building and testing the release, planning a release, planning the deployment, planning pilots, deploying the release, testing the deployment, communicating with change management and inform the change management that release has been deployed. Major, Minor, Emergency Releases- release package. Knowledge sharing – inform supporting stuff and customers what will be changed for usability and mentainablility. Good planning – if downtime required can we do several releases or changes during this window?

Knowledge Management The key purpose of knowledge management process is to gather, analyze, store and share knowledge and information within an organization; secondly, to make sure that these are available in the right place at the right time to enable better and informed decisions; and third, to improve efficiency by mitigating the need for rediscovering knowledge. Without ample or appropriate knowledge, transition will never be successful The capacity to deliver a quality service or process depends a lot on the ability of those involved to respond to situations or circumstances and that in turn completely relies on their understanding of the situation, the option, the consequences and benefits - their knowledge of the situation in which they are currently, or in which they may find themselves. The knowledge within the realm of service transition might include: Identity of stake holders Performance expectations and acceptable risk levels Timescales and available resources The quality and relevance of the knowledge relies on the accessibility, quality and continued relevance of the basic data and information available to the service staff

Practical Tasks For the designed service, identify couple of possible Cis and define their attributes and inter-relation.