1. How does ITIL help to reduce costs and minimize total
cost of ownership (TCO) for IT investments?
IT investments and staff always find that they break their
work timelines. This happens since the unscheduled work always takes priority
over the work that is planned. ITIL can help an organization stop this
continuous cycle and can therefore, help employees focus on the Total Cost of
Ownership (TCO) and other activities in their department.
2. Who decides the categorization of a proposed change
within an ITIL compliant Change Management process?
It is the task of Change Manager
A Change Manager will plays a key role in ensuring that the
projects (change initiatives) meet their objectives within timelines and said
budgets by increasing employee adoption and usage. This person will focus on
the people’s side of change, including changes to business processes, systems
and technology, job roles and organization structures.
3. After a Change has been implemented, an evaluation is
performed. What is this evaluation called?
It is known as Post Implementation Review (PIR)
PIR is an assessment and review of the complete working
solution. It will be performed after a period of live running, sometimes after
the project is completed.
The Post Implementation Review is used to evaluate the
effectiveness of system development after the system has been in production for
a specific period (usually 6 months). It is a free-form report, and not all
sections are relevant or necessary to the final product. A description of the
Post Implementation Review Report is always attached.
4. What ITIL process ensures that the organization is aware
of new and changing technology?
Capacity Management is responsible for ensuring that the
organization is aware of new and changing technology. It is the discipline that
checks and verifies that IT infrastructure is provided at the right time in the
right volume at a right price with utmost efficiency.
This involves input from many areas of the business to
identify what services are (or will be) required, what IT infrastructure is
required to support these services, what level of Contingency will be needed,
and what will be the cost of this infrastructure.
5. Suppose a Service Level Manager requires confirmation
wherein the internal Service Desk can answer a certain percentage of calls
within 10 seconds. In what document would the Service Desk’s agreement to this
requirement be recorded?
An operational level agreement (OLA) is a contract that
defines how various IT groups within a company plan to deliver a service or set
of services. OLAs are designed to address and solve the problem of IT silos by
setting forth a specific set of criteria and defining a specific set of IT
services to be performed by each department.
It should be noted that the term Service Level Agreement
(SLA) is used in many companies while discussing agreements between two
internal groups. However, according to Information Technology Infrastructure
Library (ITIL) framework for best practices, this type of internal contract
should is better known as an Operational Level Agreement.
6. What two Service Management processes will most likely
use risk analysis and management methodology?
The two service management processes are- Availability
Management and IT Service Continuity Management
ITIL Availability Management aims at defining, analyzing,
planning, measuring and improving all aspects of the availability of IT
services. Availability Management is responsible for ensuring that all IT
infrastructure, processes, tools, roles, etc are appropriate for the agreed
availability targets.
IT Service Continuity Management (ITSCM) aims at managing
risks that could seriously impact IT services. ITSCM ensures that the IT
service provider can always provide minimum agreed Service Levels, by reducing the
risk from disaster events to an acceptable level and planning for the recovery
of IT services. ITSCM should be designed to support Business Continuity
Management.
7. Explain Service portfolio, Service catalogue and service
pipeline.
Service portfolio – Defines services provided by service
provider across all Market and all customers. The objective of ITIL Service
Portfolio Management is to manage the service portfolio. Service Portfolio
Management ensures that the service provider has the right mix of services to
meet required business outcomes at an appropriate level of investment.
Service Catalogue is the sub set of Service portfolio.
Services ready to be offered to customers is listed in service catalogue. An IT
service catalog, sometimes called an IT service portfolio, is a list of
available technology resources and offerings within an organization.
Service Pipeline consists of services under development. It
is a great opportunity to view the direction of a service provider’s growth as
it discusses and includes the future services that are currently under
development by the service provider.
8. What is the difference between ITIL v3 and v2?
The ITIL v2 library was organized in seven core books:
(i) Service Support,
(ii) Service Delivery,
(iii) ICT Infrastructure Management,
(iv) Planning to Implement Service Management,
(v) Application Management,
(vi) The Business Perspective and
(vii) Security Management
On the other hand, ITIL v3 is now organized into just five
books:
(i) Service Strategy,
(ii) Service Design,
(iii) Service Transition,
(iv) Service Operation and
(v) Continual Service Improvement
Basically the V2 process areas have been logically grouped
into a phased lifecycle approach
In contrast to ITIL v2, ITIL v3 clearly defines the roles
and responsibilities in each process and reasons the role of communication in
the entire lifecycle.
9. What are the different knowledge management systems?
Different knowledge management systems are:-
CMIS (Capacity Management information system) – A Capacity
Management Information System or CMIS is a collection of IT infrastructure
usage, capacity and performance information that is gathered in a consistent
manner and stored in one or more databases. It is a single book of record for
all usage, capacity, and performance data, complete with associated business,
application and service statistics. Any IT staffer who needs access to capacity
management data can potentially use a CMIS.
AMIS (Availability management information system) – A
virtual repository of all Availability Management data, usually stored in
multiple physical locations.
KEDB (Known error database) – A Known Error is a problem
that has a documented root cause and a Work around. Known Errors are managed
throughout their lifecycle by the Problem Management process. The details of
each Known Error are recorded in a Known Error Record stored in the Known Error
Database (KEDB).
CMDB (Configuration management database)– A configuration
management database (CMDB) is a database that contains all relevant information
about the components of the information system used in an organization’s IT
services and the relationships between those components. A CMDB provides an
organized view of data and a means of examining that data from any desired
perspective. Within this context, components of an information system are
referred to as configuration items (CI). A CI can be any conceivable IT
component, including software, hardware, documentation, and personnel as well
as any combination of them. The processes of configuration management specify,
control, and track configuration items and any changes made to them in a
comprehensive and systematic fashion.
DML (Definitive media library)– A Definitive Media Library
(DML) is a secure compound in which the definitive, authorized versions of
software package configuration items (CIs) are stored and protected. A DML
consists of one or more software libraries or file-storage areas referred to as
repositories.
SKMS (Service knowledge management system) – ITIL Knowledge
Management aims at gathering, analyzing, storing and sharing knowledge and
information within an organization. The primary purpose of Knowledge Management
is to improve efficiency by reducing the need to rediscover knowledge
10. What are the ITIL based models adopted by an
organization.
Microsoft MOF: Microsoft Operations Framework (MOF) is a
series of 23 documents that guide IT professionals through the processes of
creating, implementing and managing efficient and cost-effective services.
Hewlett – Packard (HP ITSM Reference Model):– This model is
a significant tool useful in presenting and describing the several IT
Management processes, inter-process relationships, and business linkages that
IT needs to put in place for successful development, deployment and support of
services in the e-world.
IBM (IT Process Model ):– IBM Process and Service Models
software is an industry template that enables you to define common business
processes and services across the enterprise. The software consists of a set of
best practice business process models and service definitions to support core
system renewal and integration projects.
11. What is the relation between Availability, Availability
service time and downtime?
Availability % = (Available service time –downtime) /
Available service time
to ensure that all the IT services are available and are
functioning correctly whenever customers and users want to use them in the
framework of the SLAs in force.
12. What is ISO/IEC 27002?
ISO/IEC 27002:2013 gives guidelines for organizational
information security standards and information security management practices
including selection, implementation and management of controls, taking into
consideration the organization’s information security risk environment(s).
It is designed to be used by organizations that intend to:
Select controls within the process of implementing an
Information Security Management System based on ISO/IEC 27001;
Implement commonly accepted information security controls,
and
Develop their
independent information security management guidelines.
13. What is Plan-Do-Check-Act (PDSA) cycle?
The PDSA Cycle is a systematic series of steps for gaining
valuable learning and knowledge for the continual improvement of a product or
process. Also known as the Deming Wheel, or Deming Cycle, the concept and
application was first introduced to Dr. Deming by his mentor, Walter Shewhart
of the famous Bell Laboratories in New York.
The four phases in the Plan-Do-Check-Act Cycle involve:
Plan: Identifying and analyzing the problem.
Do: Developing and testing a potential solution.
Check: Measuring how effective the test solution was, and
analyzing whether it could be improved
in any way.
Act: Implementing the
improved solution fully.
14. What type of information is captured in an information
security policy?
Information security policies are the documented business
and technical rules for protecting an organization from information security
risk faced by its business and technical infrastructure. These written policy
documents provide a high-level description of the various controls, which the
organization will use to manage its information security risks.
The information security policy documents are also
considered to be a formal declaration of management’s intent to protect its
information asset from relevant risks. In specific cases, the policies are
supported by information security procedures that identify key activities
required to implement relevant information security policies.
15. What is a balanced scorecard? Balanced scorecard is a
strategic planning and management system that is used extensively in business
and industry, government, and nonprofit organizations worldwide to align
business activities to the vision and strategy of the organization, improve
internal and external communications, and monitor organization performance
against strategic goals.
Balanced scorecard is a strategic planning and management
system that is used extensively in business and industry, government, and
nonprofit organizations worldwide to align business activities to the vision
and strategy of the organization, improve internal and external communications,
and monitor organization performance against strategic goals.
16. What is a Service Request?
Service requests are a formal request submitted by a user
for some type of service, software, or hardware. A Service request generally
refers to something the user wants and/or needs but does not already have, such
as a printer or laptop. Service requests often involve items that are already
approved. For instance, if it is a company policy that all employees get access
to the cloud-based CRM system, and someone from the marketing department sends
a service request for access to the CRM, this does not need any additional
approval. The IT help desk can simply fulfill this request.
17. What type of information is stored in a CMDB?
CMDB contains contents that are intended to hold a
collection of IT assets commonly referred to as configuration items (CI) as
well as descriptive relationships between such assets. When populated, the
repository becomes a means of understanding how critical assets such as
information systems are composed, what are their upstream sources or
dependencies, and what are their downstream targets.
18. Is there a trade-off between return and risk?
According to modern portfolio theory, there is a trade-off
between risk and return. All other factors being equal, if a particular
investment incurs a higher risk of financial loss for prospective investors,
those investors must be able to expect a higher return in order to be attracted
to the higher risk.
In majority of cases, even though there is no promise of
higher returns on risky assets, so the higher risk just tends to scare off
potential investors, keeping the returns on a given investment low. The only
investments that can really try to promise higher returns for higher risk are
bonds, and even then the higher returns won’t be generated if the issuing
organization goes default.
19. What is the difference between end-users and customers?
End-User – An end user or end customer directly receives the
service or employs the product. End users are not the only customers as there
may be intermediate entities like purchasing departments, whose expectations or
needs must be carried forward through a series of service contracts or
requirement definitions.
Customer– A customer may or may not have the ability to
choose between different products and suppliers. For instance- In monopoly
situations like local telephone and cable television services, there are
scenarios when end users do not make the purchasing decision. It may include
Clients of social service agencies or court-appointed lawyers or employees of
an organization where the purchasing department makes the choices.
20. How is IT Service Continuity Management (ITSCM) related
to Business Continuity Planning (BCP)?
IT Service Continuity is a subset of Business Continuity
Planning (BCP) and encompasses IT disaster recovery planning and wider IT
resilience planning. It also incorporates those elements of IT infrastructure
and services that relate to communications such as (voice) telephony and data
communications.
It is a systematic process to prevent, predict and manage
Information and Communications Technology (ICT) disruption and incidents, which
have the potential to disrupt ICT services and should result in a more
resilient IT service capability aligned to wider organizational requirements.
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