Service Transition - Asset and Configuration Management

The traditional software configuration management (SCM) process is widely considered to be the best approach to handling changes in IT projects. We use Configuration Management to identify the functional and physical attributes of our service at various points in time, and then systematically control any changes to the identified attributes for the purpose of maintaining software integrity and traceability throughout the lifecycle of the service. In ITIL, items are managed as Configuration Items (CIs) under the control of Configuration Management.

To be efficient, every organisation needs to manage their assets well. ITIL recommends maintaining a complete inventory of assets where asset details and those who can change those assets are documented and recorded. ITIL refers to Service Asset Management as the process of managing those assets to support the overall Service Management process.

In ITIL we treat both of these functions as SACM - Service Asset and Configuration Management.

SACM activities

• Planning and Management
• Identifying Configuration Items
• Controlling Configuration
• Status Reporting
• Auditing

The protection of assets is an important part of the ITIL service lifecycle. All service assets are identified and recorded during SACM. We report, audit and verify our assets on regular basis to capture attributes, versions and baselines. Penalties for not managing assets correctly can include fines and service outages. These are the kind of things we want to avoid.

By capturing information and keeping it up to date, we help people make informed decisions at the right time. In addition, providing accurate configuration information can proactively help resolve incidents and problems much faster. We all know that having the information to hand is much better than having to go out and find it.

Benefits

By implementing SCAM we can:

• Provide better forecasting
• Help new releases to be implemented successfully
• Resolve incidents faster (out of date information is never helpful!)
• Adhere to standards and contracts
• Track costs associated with the service

See also

• ISO 10007 Quality management - Guidelines for configuration management
• IEEE Std. 828-1998 IEEE Standard for Software Configuration Management Plans
• CMDB
• DML