1. IT Asset Management Status Update Hardware Asset Handling
December 2014 | Dogan Weber

2. Service Desk Involvement for Hardware Asset Handling
In order to have consistent data for IT assets, the asset records need to be updated and maintained if certain actions are triggered.
This “tracking” of the device status, asset assignments and other changes can either be a manual exercise or could be automated.
This document will give an overview of both approaches and the general steps needed for administering hardware asset records.
IT Asset Management Hardware Handling| December 2014 | Dogan Weber

3. Manual Approach
This section explains Service Delivery involvement in the administration of hardware assets with a mostly manual approach.
The administration steps are executed on key points throughout the hardware lifecycle.
The linkage between the CI and the asset is done via the serial number which acts as key identifier between the two different types of records.
IT Asset Management Hardware Handling| December 2014 | Dogan Weber

4. IT Asset Management Hardware Handling Action Chain Step 1: REQ Approval
IT Asset Management Hardware Handling| December 2014 | Dogan Weber

5. IT Asset Management Hardware Handling Action Chain Step 1: REQ approval
IT Asset Management Hardware Handling| December 2014 | Dogan Weber

6. IT Asset Management Hardware Handling Action Chain Step 2: Order Placement
IT Asset Management Hardware Handling| December 2014 | Dogan Weber

7. IT Asset Management Hardware Handling Action Chain Step 2: Order Placement
IT Asset Management Hardware Handling| December 2014 | Group IT

8. IT Asset Management Hardware Handling Action Chain Step 3: Receive Order
IT Asset Management Hardware Handling| December 2014 | Dogan Weber

9. IT Asset Management Hardware Handling Action Chain Step 3: Receive Order
IT Asset Management Hardware Handling| December 2014 | Dogan Weber

10. IT Asset Management Hardware Handling Action Chain Step 4: Create Asset Record
IT Asset Management Hardware Handling| December 2014 | Dogan Weber

11. IT Asset Management Hardware Handling Action Chain Step 4: Create Asset Record
IT Asset Management Hardware Handling| December 2014 | Dogan Weber

12. IT Asset Management Hardware Handling Action Chain Step 4: Create Asset Record
IT Asset Management Hardware Handling| December 2014 | Dogan Weber

13. IT Asset Management Hardware Handling Action Chain Step 4: Create Asset Record
IT Asset Management Hardware Handling| December 2014 | Dogan Weber

14. IT Asset Management Hardware Handling Action Chain Step 5: Configure
IT Asset Management Hardware Handling| December 2014 | Dogan Weber

15. IT Asset Management Hardware Handling Action Chain Step 5: Configure
IT Asset Management Hardware Handling| December 2014 | Dogan Weber

16. IT Asset Management Hardware Handling Action Chain Step 6: Deliver
IT Asset Management Hardware Handling| December 2014 | Dogan Weber

17. IT Asset Management Hardware Handling Action Chain Step 6: Deliver
IT Asset Management Hardware Handling| December 2014 | Dogan Weber

18. IT Asset Management Hardware Handling Action Chain Step 6: Deliver
In order to associate a delivered asset to a user, the Service Desk staff needs to assign the asset to the receiving user
Assigning an asset to a user ensures the linkage to location and department data
IT Asset Management Hardware Handling| December 2014 | Dogan Weber

19. IT Asset Management Hardware Handling Action Chain Step 6: Deliver
Calculated
IT Asset Management Hardware Handling| December 2014 | Dogan Weber

20. Automated Approach
The manual approach requires at least two points of interaction between Service Delivery Staff and the asset records in order to introduce a new asset into the environment with all needed data
These steps will add up during the course of the asset’s lifecycle in order to have all the fields updated properly (Status, Assignment, Cost Centers, etc.)
In an optimal world, these steps should not be needed in order to minimize risk of data inaccuracy, manpower effort and redundant workflow actions
IT Asset Management Hardware Handling| December 2014 | Dogan Weber

21. Hardware Asset Management – Asset Handling Automated Action Chain
IT Asset Management Hardware Handling| December 2014 | Dogan Weber

22. IT Asset Management Hardware Handling Automated Action Chain
Note the missing interaction with any asset related records
How is this obtained?
IT Asset Management Hardware Handling| December 2014 | Dogan Weber

23. IT Asset Management Hardware Handling Asset Creation Automation
The key to the asset tracking automation is the automated data integration between discovery data sources (Flexera) into Service Now
IT Asset Management Hardware Handling| December 2014 | Dogan Weber

24. IT Asset Management Hardware Handling Asset Creation Automation
The key to the asset tracking automation is the automated data integration between discovery data sources (Flexera) into Service Now
The key step to kick off the automated discovery and asset creation process is for the Service Delivery Staff to stage the machine
IT Asset Management Hardware Handling| December 2014 | Dogan Weber

25. IT Asset Management Asset Creation Automation
After staging of the machine, it is ready to be picked up by our discovery methods
IT Asset Management Hardware Handling| December 2014 | Dogan Weber

26. IT Asset Management Asset Creation Automation
After staging of the machine, it is ready to be picked up by our discovery methods
The discovery system (FlexNet Manager) will discover the machine’s serial number and write it to its own internal database
IT Asset Management Hardware Handling| December 2014 | Dogan Weber

27. IT Asset Management Asset Creation Automation
After staging of the machine, it is ready to be picked up by our discovery methods
The discovery system (FlexNet Manager) will discover the machine’s serial number and write it to its own internal database
ServiceNow uses SQL-queries to sync up with the discovery database changes
IT Asset Management Hardware Handling| December 2014 | Dogan Weber

28. IT Asset Management Hardware Handling Asset Creation Automation
ServiceNow recognizes the Serial numbers of imported CIs
With the CI’s serial number, ServiceNow determines if a record needs to be updated or newly created
This enables a frequent sync with the discovery data sources to ensure up-to-date data records
IT Asset Management Hardware Handling| December 2014 | Dogan Weber

29. IT Asset Management Hardware Handling Asset Creation Automation
When a machine is staged, ServiceNow only syncs it’s CI records to the discovery data source
The Model Category link to the CI creates an Hardware Asset if a new CI is created (and vice versa)
This enables us to automatically create assets as soon as a new machines are staged
IT Asset Management Hardware Handling| December 2014 | Dogan Weber

30. IT Asset Management Hardware Handling Asset Creation Automation
FlexNet Manager discovers more than the serial
The model type for example can be used to add a average price to the asset
ServiceNow uses the link between Hardware Assets and Hardware Models to add additional information to the Assets
Example: If we know the average price of HP 820 laptops is 1100CHF, we can add this value to all discovered HP 820 based assets
IT Asset Management Hardware Handling| December 2014 | Dogan Weber

31. IT Asset Management Hardware Handling Asset Creation Automation
The same concept applies to user data for the user of a specific machine
SCCM and FlexNetManager can discover the main user of an asset
This data can be used to automatically calculate division, department, cost center, region, location and default support group
This data can be used to enrich the asset
All these values can be reported against
IT Asset Management Hardware Handling| December 2014 | Dogan Weber

32. IT Asset Management Hardware Handling Asset Creation Automation
This automated approach enables us to track the asset with all business relevant information throughout its lifecycle
The Service Delivery staff only have to stage the computers to ensure data availability. No further interaction required.
All fields held by ServiceNow records are available for reporting
Additional attributes from the discovery data sources can be added with very little development effort
IT Asset Management Hardware Handling| December 2014 | Dogan Weber

33. CONCLUSION
IT Asset Management Hardware Handling| December 2014 | Dogan Weber