What is IT Service Management?

FORT LAUDERDALE, FL / ACCESSWIRE / January 26, 2021 / IT Service Management (ITSM) is often regarded as the sum of every process involved with the IT lifecycle in terms of designing, delivering, and supporting IT outcomes on behalf of a business.

ITSM is more than the mere actions of support that the IT team provides. They are a distinct set of policies put into practice by a workplace or a Managed Services Provider. While the ITSM policies in every workplace are unique, the guiding principles include regularizing processes and generating end-to-end coverage.

ITSM Processes

A computer in the office goes down and a new one must be installed and connected to the workplace networks. Who is responsible for the installation? Where does this fall on the list of priorities?

ITSM is the overarching approach to how IT teams deliver their services to their customers. The process can occur in several steps. For example, Service Request Management would happen when the copy machine was delivered. This element of ITSM is made to be repeatable and mostly automated. The request for the copy machine would be processed through a ticket system, for example.

Knowledge management involves creating, sharing, and managing knowledge; basically, it is making the most out of what the IT team knows. They might understand any shortcuts to hook up the copier to those networks in the office.

IT Asset Management is all about putting the right items and people in place to do the best by tracking and implementing them as necessary. If you have someone specializing in copier installation and set up in your company, they should spearhead this project.

These are just some of the examples of ITSM in practice, but the measures also include Incident Management (returning assets to a functional state), Problem Management (identifying root causes of problems and fixing them) and Change Management (implementing changes in a short time frame).

ITIL and ITSM

Several approaches to ITSM exist in the present. One of them is Information Technology Infrastructure Library (ITIL), a set of practices focused on aligning a business’s needs with IT. The entire goal is to plan, implement, and measure outcomes in such a way that compliance and improvement are consistently developed.

The components of this strategy include:

Creating, delivering, and supporting IT outcomes
Driving stakeholder value
Implementing high velocity IT practices
Planning and improving systems and practices

ITIL is just one approach to ITSM, but it represents some of the practice’s best elements.

Benefits for Businesses

Any business that implements an ITSM framework is likely to experience many benefits, including:

The ability to respond quickly to changing conditions
Fewer service interruptions and a faster recovery
Improved compliance across the business
Increased collaboration between IT assets
Greater transparency and productivity

In short, businesses benefit from having ITSM implemented in their workplace. From improving old processes to automating elements of IT services, every business can do better within this framework.

ITSM and its associated frameworks, like ITIL, are changing how businesses are considering their information technology efforts. Each process is scrutinized for potential improvement, and every asset is being optimized in business settings within companies that utilize ITSM. The future of IT is rapidly changing to a standardized, highly efficient process, and companies of all sorts need to start putting these plans into practice to stay on the cutting edge.