An introduction to the field of IT Service Management

What is IT Service Management? This is the first question that flits through one’s head when one comes across an invitation to join itSMF. Let’s attempt to do away with some of the fog surrounding the interpretation of the term 'IT Service Management', so we can comprehend exactly what the field encompasses, its areas of focus and why we need to study it in the first place.

To achieve this, let’s first take a look at ITIL V3’s definition of ‘IT Service’:

An IT Service is a service provided to one or more customers by an IT service provider. An IT service is based on the use of IT and supports the customer's business processes. An IT service is made up from a combination of people, processes and technology and should be defined in a Service Level Agreement.

IT Service Management (ITSM) is a sub-discipline of Information Technology where the focus is on extracting that value out of Information Systems and Technology which holds greatest relevance in the context of the customer. i.e. Technology based services are provided with the intent of maximizing the value of the service and its contribution to the business as perceived by the customer. Therefore, ITSM is a completely customer-centric approach and greatly differs from traditional technology-centered IT management methods.

In ITSM, we normally take a high-level view of IT – for example, the structure and interconnectivity of systems comprising a network. It is important to note that the focus, in this case, is not on how each system is implemented and what it consists of. Those of you programmers who’re familiar with OOP, think of ITSM as an application of the concept of Abstraction. You ignore/hide the irrelevant details – in this case, the technical implementation - and focus on what’s relevant- here, the customer.

ITSM is closely related to the fields of Information Systems Management, IT portfolio management and IT Governance. As you read about different topics in this blog, you will come to understand how. We will also devote a section later on to exploring these subjects in the context of ITSM.

ITSM also goes hand in hand with Lean IT. In service management, we follow a process-centric approach as opposed to a product-centric approach. Consequently, ITSM is all about process efficiency and effectiveness.

For those of you who’re all for structured definitions, here you go!

IT Service Management (ITSM) is a process-based practice intended to align the delivery of information technology (IT) services with needs of the enterprise, emphasizing benefits to customers. ITSM involves a paradigm shift from managing IT as stacks of individual components to focusing on the delivery of end-to-end services using best practice process models.
(From http://www.bitpipe.com/tlist/IT-Service-Management.html)

Bibliography
Bon, J. v. (2007). IT Service Management: An introduction. Van Haren Publishing.

Prepared and posted by Hamsa Mukund, MSIS, Class of 2012