Plan Phase Workflow

 

The following figure shows the relationship between the SMFs and management reviews (MRs) in the Plan Phase.

 

  

Figure 2. The Plan Phase workflow

Service Management Functions Within the Plan Phase 

To help IT professionals effectively plan and optimize an IT strategy, MOF provides service management functions (SMFs) that define the processes, people, and activities required to align IT services to the requirements of the business. SMFs identify and describe the primary activities that IT professionals perform within the various phases of the IT service lifecycle. Although each SMF can be thought of and used as a stand-alone set of processes, it is when they are combined that they most effectively ensure that service delivery is complete and at the desired quality and risk levels. The service management functions are organized to achieve a specific purpose and outcome.   

The following table identifies the SMFs that support the achievement of these objectives within the Plan Phase. 

Table 1. Plan Phase SMFs

SMF

Deliverable/Purpose

Outcomes

Business/IT Alignment

Deliverable: IT service strategy

Purpose:

• Deliver the right set of compelling services as perceived by the business

 

• IT service portfolio that is mapped to business processes, functions, and capabilities 
• Compelling services that support the business needs
• Knowledge of service demand and usage
• Customer satisfaction

Reliability

Deliverable: IT standards

Purpose:

• Ensure  that service capacity, service availability, service continuity, and data integrity are aligned to the business needs in a cost-effective manner

 

• Reliability plans
• Reliability performance reports
• Predictable services

Policy

Deliverable: IT policies

Purpose:

• Efficiently define and manage IT policies required for the implementation of business policies and the effectiveness of IT

 

• Documented IT policies that are mapped to business policies
• IT policies required for the effective management of IT
• Policies documented for the following areas:
  • Security
  • Privacy
  • Appropriate use
  • Partner and third-party management
  • Asset protection

Financial Management

Deliverable: IT financial plan and measurement

Purpose:

• Accurately predict, account for, and optimize costs of required resources to deliver an end-to-end service to ensure correct investments

 

• Accurate accounting of IT expenditures; costs mapped to IT services
• Budget that supports required IT investments
• Model to determine IT investment opportunities and predict lifecycle costs

The SMFs in this phase do not have to be performed in sequence but they do have a natural order:  

• Business/IT Alignment acts as the coordinating SMF, taking input from the other SMFs in the phase to drive business value and the IT service strategy. 
• Reliability, financial Management, and policy are ongoing functions that support the planning and optimization of the IT service strategy.

Each of these SMFs is documented in its own guide:

• Business/IT Alignment Service Management Function
• Reliability Service Management Function
• Policy Service Management Function
• Financial Management Service Management Function

Management Reviews for the Phase

The management reviews (MRs) for the Plan Phase—the Service Alignment Review and the Portfolio Review—provide a structure for reviewing and analyzing results and taking action to improve performance.    

Service Alignment Management Review

The Service Alignment MR provides an important view into the Plan Phase of the IT service lifecycle. It is focused on understanding the state of supply and demand for IT services and directing investments to make sure that the business value of IT is realized. The review should asses the customers’ experience of IT services compared to service goals as well as how IT is delivering that experience in terms of reliability, compliance, cost effectiveness, and value realization.

To deliver an effective review of Service Alignment, IT management must orchestrate several activities and then participate in the review itself. Participation is needed from operations, service managers, the business, key stakeholders in IT initiatives, as well as parties responsible for developing business cases and ensuring value realization from IT investments. The review serves a key governance function in terms of bringing together people who have decision-making authority and those with the information needed for analysis. The result should be decisions to proceed with certain initiatives and changes, rejection of requests, or the determination that additional information is needed for decision making.

It is important that these reviews are seen as a form of internal control. To this end, documentation of the review should include who the participants are, the goal of the review, the decisions made, the proposed initiatives and changes that resulted, and the intended outcomes of initiatives and changes (how they will support management objectives).

Additionally the review presents the opportunity to identify barriers that decrease business/IT alignment or inhibit innovation to the degree that business value is negatively affected.

The following table describes the type of information needed to conduct the review and some of the analysis considerations for the review.

Table 2. Components of the Service Alignment Management Review

Inputs

Analyses

Decisions

Outputs

SLA metrics

New business requirements, proposals, forecasts

New regulatory requirements

New policy requirements

Customer satisfaction surveys, other end user feedback

Feedback from the Operational Health review in the Operate Phase

Demand management report

Reliability report

Financial reconciliation and new budget requirements

Audit reports, issues,  recommendations

Senior management directives

Budgeted vs. actual spending

Value realization data  

 

Security/privacy incidents?

Non-compliance incidents?

Satisfactory performance, consistently cost effective?

Satisfactory features, business-process fit?

Satisfaction with support?

New requirements, features, processes, services?

Innovation value; prototyping, innovating, new technologies?

People, capabilities matched to responsibilities?

Value realization in place and tracking?

Funding and spending appropriate and fit portfolio?

 

Improvement goals and potential activities identified

Impacts to services:

• Create?
• Modify?
• Decommission?

Risks identified and addressed for chosen plan of action

Initiatives and proposals that require further investigation

Funding reallocations

 

Proposed changes to service portfolio:

• Enhancements to  existing services
• New services
• Decommissioned services

Updates to services

Service health assessment

Proposed budgets and project spending activities

Areas for continued investigation and assigned accountabilities

Summary report of participants, decisions made, and intended results

This MR results in an understanding of the impact of the new services on IT strategy and officially proposes new services, changes to existing services (such as service improvements) that are larger than standard changes, and decommissioning of features and services.

Portfolio Management Review

The Portfolio MR acts as a gateway in the Plan Phase of the IT service lifecycle. It focuses on understanding the concepts and requirements of proposed IT service changes, on deciding whether to invest further in the development of those concepts, and approving a preliminary project vision and scope that will move a project forward into the Envision SMF in the Deliver Phase of the lifecycle. The Portfolio MR results in business and IT agreeing on expectations for value and impact of the proposed work. The review establishes the basis for how changes to the portfolio and its value to the business will be measured and evaluated.

The intentions of this MR are to determine that IT is working on the right things to positively impact the business and clarifying what capabilities of the business will be enabled or improved by the proposed projects. The review also confirms stakeholder understanding and support by establishing expectations for scope, value realization, and the intent of initiatives in terms of impact on the organization, customers, and the IT portfolio.

The alignment of business and IT is improved by:

• Defining the context of the project.
• Identifying and clarifying areas of ambiguity before proceeding.
• Judging the fit with the current portfolio.
• Taking into account existing services and initiatives in the pipeline that will result in the “to-be” IT environment.

Participation in this MR should involve an advisory board of those with the authority and knowledge required to make the relevant investment decisions. This board should include the executive sponsor for the project, business stakeholders, project team members, and representatives of enterprise architecture, finance, and the project management office, if one exists.

Table 3. Dimensions of the Portfolio Management Review

Inputs

Analyses

Decisions

Outputs

Project concept proposals and other change requests

Key improvements to business capabilities

Key enablers for business processes

Proposed value realization

High-level funding estimates

IT portfolio

Status of in-flight projects

Existing and upcoming IT architecture

Regulatory, standards-based, and industry-specific requirements

Process guidelines and policies

Metrics and trends for the Project Concept  MR itself

Discretionary or non-discretionary initiative

Goodness-of-fit with:

• Strategy and shared goals
• Other initiatives
• Budget
• Architecture
• Standards and regulations
• Capabilities
• Timing
• Portfolio risk tolerance

Executive stakeholder support

Initiative scope and complexity

Risk Management

Innovation approach

Portfolio MR performance

Projects:

• Approved
• Delayed or returned for further analysis
• Denied

Value realization metrics for approved initiatives

Risk analysis and management approach are adequate

Improvements to the Portfolio MR process

Project Charter - preliminary vision and scope approved

Initial project team determined

Approved project(s) to be published in the IT portfolio

Summarized expected improvement to business by these additions to the IT portfolio

Documented decision process

Record of denied projects kept for future learning

Approved approach to managing organizational and workflow changes resulting from solution

Awareness communications for Portfolio MR results

The ultimate outcome of the Portfolio MR is the initial project charter. With the charter in hand, the team can begin the process of creating the project plan that will ultimately result in building and delivering new or updated services.

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