21 Must Know Itsm Terms And Terminologies

IT Service Management (ITSM) refers to the implementation and management of quality IT services that meet the needs of an organization. The processes involved under ITSM are carried out in a hybrid manner.

In a traditional service desk, the support staff solely handles the generation and resolution of a ticket raised by an employee. Whereas in a modern service desk, some of these processes are carried out with the help of AI technologies such as Chatbots and virtual assistants.

1. Help Desk/Service Desk:

In IT Organizations, a Service Desk acts as a one-stop-shop for all the employees. The support staff of an organization attends to the problems and pain points of employees and passes them along to upper-level engineers if these problems are complex and provide an overall positive experience.

Let us see how this works:

Consider an employee registers a ticket through the portal. If it is an L1 ticket, it is either resolved through the portal itself with the help of AI Technologies in a modern service desk, otherwise, it is resolved through the support staff. If this ticket cannot be resolved, it is escalated to L2 or L3 depending on the complexity of the issue. After which the tickets are resolved with the help of upper-level engineers.

2. Information Technology Infrastructure Library (ITIL):

ITIL as the name suggests is a library consisting of the best practices for delivering IT services. This helps Organizations manage risks, increase customer satisfaction, establish cost-saving yet effective practices to be followed and finally build an environment that allows for growth, change, and scale.

When organizations make use of ITIL, the benefits achieved can include cost reduction by optimizing the use of resources, improved service delivery, and customer satisfaction.

3. Configuration Management:

Configuration Management (CM) belongs to the Information Technology Infrastructure Library and is defined as a process that encompasses every element of the IT system - from servers in the data headquarters to end-user equipment.

CM tracks all of the individual Configuration Items (CI) in an IT organization which may be as simple as a single server, or as complex as the entire IT department. In some organizations, a configuration manager is responsible to oversee and manage the CM process.

4. Incident Management:

An incident is an unexpected disruption to a service which in turn affects the end user’s productivity. Examples of Incidents include printer issues, application lock issues, email service issues, laptop crashes, AD authentication errors.

Incident management is the process of specifying, analyzing, and validating threats to prevent the reoccurrence of an incident. These incidents within a structure are generally handled by either an Incident Response Team (IRT), an Incident Management Team (IMT), or Incident Command System (ICS).

5. Self-Service Portal:

A Self-Service portal acts as an interface for users to resolve incidents/problems on their own, get knowledge for establishing personal devices on the firm network, or oppositely interact with main IT purposes without cataloging a support ticket.

6. Knowledge Centre:

A Knowledge Centre is an interior catalog of key evidence, tutorials, and agencies about the company's ITSM processes, skills, and agreements.

7. Problem Management:

It is an ITSM module responsible for managing the life cycle of all problems. It makes use of basic analytics to identify the root cause of repeated incidents and help the IT and support teams identify the changes that need to be made to prevent them from reoccurring.

8. Change Management:

Software dedicated to governing different procedures within the IT bureau. Functionalities can fluctuate between explanation providers, but core capacities include scheduling changes, automating the documentation process, furnishing affiliation equipment, and stimulating managerial authorization refines with technical notifications.

9. Configuration Management Database:

A CMDB contains every form of item in the institution. The purpose is to create an exact directory of each item, to which degree system calculation tools are used to demonstrate to you how each system relates to each other. This lets you understand the inter-dependencies within the IT composition and enables users to effectively launch the likely consequences of any moves, expands, or differences within the layout.

10. Release Management:

Release management uses automation functions, collaboration tools to streamline the changes that must be made when releasing new apps and services into the configuration. A release management platform is designed to handle some of the specific challenges that come with new app releases. For example, release management systems can roll out multiple instances of an app simultaneously so that users aren't performing rote data entry as they upload apps in all the necessary locations.

11. Software as a Service:

Software as a Service (SaaS) also called “On-demand Software” is a Software and Licensing model which is released on a subscription basis and is centrally hosted by the vendor. For example, Google Workspace, Dropbox, Salesforce, Cisco WebEx, Concur, GoToMeeting

12. Asset Management:

Asset Management comprises the processes responsible for tracking, reporting the value, and the ownership of the assets belonging to an Organization throughout the asset’s life cycle.

13. Key performance indicator (KPI):

It is a metric used to measure the achievement of critical success factors for an organization. It is also used to help manage an IT service, process, plan, project, or other activity. Service desks should identify and select those KPIs to ensure that efficiency, effectiveness, and cost-effectiveness are all managed.

14. Service-level agreement (SLA):

A service-level agreement is an agreement between a service provider and a client that discusses the different aspects of the service, including quality, availability, and responsibilities.

15. Root cause analysis (RCA):

It is a systematic process for finding and identifying the root cause of a problem or event. The concept of RCA is derived from the idea which states that having a truly effective system means more than just putting out fires all day. This root cause when removed, restores normalcy and prevents the problem from reoccurring.

16. Enterprise service management (ESM):

ESM in a nutshell is the practice of applying ITSM to various other areas of an enterprise or organization to improve efficiency, performance, and service delivery. It enables departments within an organization to stay connected to each other and external resources. For example, ESM can be applied to Customer Support, Finance, and Accounting.

17. L1, L2, and L3 Escalation:

These are the various IT support levels where-

• L0- Deals with the service desk with very little skills on any subject or technical area
  
  
• L1 - Has a working knowledge of the technical or functional area
  
  
• L2 - More knowledge - senior people who may have years of experience
  
  
• L3 - May involve the vendor itself
  
  

Let us take the example of a Hospital visit made by a patient.

• L0- You go to the receptionist (L0)
  
  
• L1- The nurse may take your information, take your pulse, and BP
  
  
• L2- The nurse on duty will interview and work to determine if any specialist is needed and try to 'fix' your issue or escalate it to the next level
  
  
• L3 and so on- The surgeon/specialist would look at the issues that L2 cannot do - Surgery
  
  

18. Workaround:

Workarounds are simply temporary solutions given to a user when a user is faced with a problem. For example, rebooting a PC or server to get it working again when an issue arises. It doesn’t fix the issue; it merely removes it temporarily.

19. Project management:

It is defined as an organized process that involves planning, organizing, managing, and controlling IT projects to accomplish specific IT goals. Some key components of Project management are Scope, Time, Cost, Quality, Integration, Procurement, Human Resources, Communications, Risk Management, and Stake Holder Management

20. Service catalog:

A service catalog is defined as a centralized database of accurate information about active IT service offerings, and a subset of the IT service provider's service portfolio. It acts as a storefront from where end-users (internal or external) request services and products from the IT service desk based on the information provided in the service catalog.

21. AISM:

Artificially Intelligent Service Management (AISM) is a tool that makes use of the current ITSM technologies like Incident Management, Problem Management, Asset Management, and so on but with the help of AI, it makes these processes way more efficient than the traditional ITSM help desk.

Here’s how it does it:

AISM makes use of 3 key aspects which are Guidance, Learning, and Strategy to make the existing ITSM more efficient-

• Guidance – Whenever an end-user has a requirement, AISM makes a connection with endpoint tools to identify and make relevant suggestions based on the need of the user.
  
  
• Learning – AISM maintains a knowledge base to ensure that all kinds of information are always available without a hassle.
  
  
• Strategy – AISM makes use of AI to identify and recommend changes to the current system and provide suggestions for innovations that can benefit the organization.