The concept of IT service design is certainly not a new one, but in the past, organizations have had to focus first on improving the underlying operational processes which act as the foundation of the IT enterprise. Industry Best Practice guidance, such as ITIL and ISO20000, describes most processes, although certain aspects could be given greater prominence: security management, application management, software change management, IT asset management, a close mapping of project management and resource management.
The lack of detail within these elements poses a problem when an organization decides to move to an IT service design model, because quality, stability and availability of an IT service are determined by all of the lifecycles that flow in and out of the service lifecycle.
For example, IT Assets have their own lifecycle, from the time of requisition through to retirement, and this overlaps at predetermined points of the overall service lifecycle: impacts from one, have a domino effect on the others.
This book helps readers to understand how better to apply process discipline to their environment, in order to deliver a higher quality of service at a lower cost to their business. It also covers best practice as described in all three versions of ITIL, and treats ITIL in generic, rather than version-specific terms. Where a particular version is applicable, it is clearly specified in the text.
