University ITSM

Information technology service management is the practice of managing an IT infrastructure by employing a service-oriented perspective. A best practice framework known as ITIL offers guidelines on how to manage an IT portfolio by viewing it as a collection of services that provide value to customers. ITIL orients its guidance around the lifecycle of a service beginning with conceiving a strategy, followed by designing the service, and subsequently transitioning the service into an operational mode. Following processes as outlined in ITIL v3 throughout an IT service’s lifecycle can significantly improve the resilience of the service in event of a disaster.

In the design phase of the service lifecycle, decisions are made involving processes such as service continuity management, service level management, and supplier management. Service continuity management thoroughly addresses disaster management. Activities in this process include the creation of recovery plans and procedures, completion of business impact analysis, and the development of an IT risk assessment. The main goal of service continuity management is to ensure that services can be recovered in a timely manner in event of a major disruption.

Service level management is the process of establishing agreed upon requirements that must be met for the service to be considered as performing at an acceptable level. It also encompasses activities related to monitoring those service levels when the service is operational. Through this process, service owners have the ability to influence the service’s design by establishing service level agreements that outline the details of how a service should perform.

Supplier management includes the activities associated with selecting and working with suppliers to ensure that they agree to deliver services in a way that will not adversely impact established service level agreements. Service providers and suppliers negotiate responsibilities of providing the service through the use of underpinning contracts. These contracts, as the name implies, must be met in order to satisfy the conditions of the service level agreement.

In the operations phase of the service lifecycle, processes such as incident management and problem management provide guidance for the response to the loss of service. Incident management is the process of quickly restoring the service to the customer by whatever means necessary. A related process, problem management, focuses on thoroughly resolving the underlying cause of the service disruption.

For example, if an emergency worker reports that he cannot make calls via his cellular phone in the wake of a disaster, the goal of incident management would be to quickly resolve the issue potentially by issuing the worker a two-way radio as another form of communication in the field. Problem management, on the other hand, would seek to resolve the root cause of this and similar incidents by rebuilding the cellular tower that was destroyed.

The utilization of information technology service management principles can significantly improve the quality of disaster management at all phases of a disaster. ITIL principles are applicable ranging from the initial design of the service and especially during disaster response when service levels have been breached. During these critical hours following commonly recognized process and using a shared vernacular can yield its biggest benefits.