In the last decades, we have witnessed a dynamic increase in the use of IT in our everyday life. At home, at work or in the street, we more and more often face the technologies which decades or even a dozen years ago used to be present only in Sci-Fi literature. Nowadays, most countries take into account the need for progressing computerisation in their societies.  The growth in the use of IT technologies provides the possibilities of significant reduction in costs associated with the labour market, creating and sending documents and supporting production and management processes in each sector of the economy.

With the progress of computerization, the market for IT services aimed at both individual customers and companies is incredibly increasing.  Nowadays, more and more jobs can be done over the Internet. Paying bills, downloading and listening to music, sending and receiving mail, video conferencing or even making appointments at the doctor’s via the Internet is very convenient.

For many years, it has been enforcing the need for defining the processes and standardizing the terminology in the area of IT services. So called Best Practices are such a common language for the world of IT services, and the most recognized among them is ITIL library.

ITIL shows how to model the processes and implement IT services as efficiently as possible in commercial and non-commercial organizations, regardless of a company size, type of an organization or the tools that are available. ITIL is a collection of best practices related to IT service management in a company and presents a process oriented approach to business organization. In ITIL methodology, the concept of organizing IT sections as IT service provider. The collection consists of a set of publications describing processes, functions and systems which should exist in an organization that provides IT services. The above set allows the management of services on each level of service operation. The main phases of a service lifecycle are:

• Strategy – the goal of Service Strategy is to assess how to meet the essential needs of a customer, relevant to the achievement of their business objectives. At this point, the criteria and mechanisms determining the selection of the services offered by the provider are defined.  Strategic management of IT services is the process which is to ensure that the strategy is defined, maintained and achieves its goals
• Design – the objective of this stage includes: optimal service design so as to minimize the number of possible changes in the future; the application of continuous improvement in all areas of service design to make the solutions more effective; the identification of changing trends in business, and then preparing a better offer
• Transition – the role of service transition is to ensure that new or changed services meet business expectations documented in the phases Service Strategy and Service Design, and the services which do not fulfil the expectations will be withdrawn
• Operation – the aim of this phase is the coordination as well as performing the tasks and processes essential for service management and service provision on the settled level, for the users of a business organization and customers. Service operation is also responsible for the permanent management of the technology used for service delivery and support
• Continual Service Improvement – the role of continual service improvement in the service lifecycle according to ITIL is the customization of IT services to changing business needs through the identification and improvement of IT services that support business processes

BMC Remedy IT Service Management (ITSM) is the world’s leader in products based on ITIL’s best practices. This solution ensures seamless and immediate workflow automation within the processes based on ITIL library.  With years of experience in working with this product we help implement the procedures enabling continuous improvement of IT services focusing not only on the technical parameters but also on the development and implementation of the technical and management staff development strategy responsible for the management of service lifecycle.
More information related to ITIL can be found on the official ITIL website and on itSMF website – the organization which deals with development and promotion of best practises in IT service management:

• http://www.itil-officialsite.com/
• http://www.itsmfi.org/
• http://www.itsmf.org.pl/