Service desk is not a process but a function whose objective is to provide a single point of contact between users and the IT service organisation.   It is an important part of customer service that should:

• Provide a record of all incident statistics and a record of what IT people are using.
• Manage the Incident Management process and should support business operations and provider management information.
• Act as a cost effective way of providing customer contact and allow organisations to reduce user enquiries over time.  It should assist in speeding up problem-solving and allow problems to be caught early on.

Incident Management is a key component in both ITIL and customer service as customers use it to communicate with IT on a daily basis. The better the Incident is managed the happier customers will be.

The goal for ITIL Incident Management is defined in the ITIL publication as follows:

"The primary goal of the Incident Management process is to restore normal service operation as quickly as possible and minimise the adverse impact on business operations, thus ensuring that the best possible levels of service quality and availability are maintained. "

As stated above the main aim of Incident Management is to restore normal service as quickly as possible.  The key tasks involved are:

Documentation - record all calls

Support - making an initial assessment to help users

Classification - comparing the incident to others and referring it to Problem Management if appropriate

Investigation - investigating the incident. Further diagnostic work can be  carried out by Problem Management or specialist support staff

Monitoring - tracking the progress of the incident and keeping the and tracking customer informed

Resolution - restoring services and recording all incident control actions

Closure - formally closing the incident by reviewing and categorising it, and signing off by the customer

Problem Management is an important part of ITIL as it allows organisations to better manage and resolve underlying problems and in turn increase the availability of business services.  In practice an effective Problem Management process is quite often the ITIL process that can deliver one of the highest returns.

The goal for ITIL Problem Management is defined in the ITIL publication as follows:

"The goal of Problem Management is to minimise the adverse impact of Incidents and Problems on the business that are caused by errors within the IT Infrastructure, and to prevent recurrence of Incidents related to these errors."

In order to achieve this goal Problem Management seeks to get to the root cause of Incidents and then initiate actions to improve or correct the situation.  The Problem Management process has both a reactive and proactive aspect.  The reactive aspect is concerned with solving Problems in response to one or more Incidents.  Proactive Problem Management is concerned with identifying and solving Problems and Known Errors before Incidents occur in the first place.

The main tasks in Problem Management include:

• Identifying, diagnosing and recording the root causes of incidents, to prevent problems from a single source recurring
• Carrying out severity analysis and providing appropriate support
• Identifying potential problems before they can cause disruptions to IT services
• Initiating Requests for Change to prevent problems from occurring
• Putting right known errors under the control of Change Management
  

Change Management is a vital ITIL component in today's rapidly changing world.  It aims to give organisations a structured and disciplined approach to the process of changes to any IT business service.

ITIL Change Management is defined in the ITIL publication as follows:

"The process of controlling changes to the infrastructure, or any aspect of services, in a controlled manner thus enabling approved changes to be implemented with minimum disruption."

The main objective of Change Management is to ensure that standardised methods and procedures are used for efficient and prompt handling of all Changes in order to minimise the impact of Change-related Incidents upon service quality, and consequently to improve the day-to-day operations of the organisation.

With Change Management it is important that the process has a high visibility across the organisation to promote a smooth Change process.  The main tasks of Change Management are:

Processing requests for changes – they should be assessed for impact, importance, costs, benefits and impacts on other Configuration Items.

Change scheduling – allocate resources and manage change schedule

Change building – allocate actual changes to engineering and ensure there are documented back-out procedures.

Change recording – ensure that all changes are logged, tracked and reviewed.

Release Management is often seen as a subset of Change Management however it is an important ITIL element because it is often the release of a change that fails rather than the change itself.

The main tasks of Release Management are clear and comprehensive:

• Plan and manage the rollout of software and related hardware
• Design and implement procedures for the distribution and installation of changes to It systems
• Ensure that only correct, authorised and tested versions are installed
• Communicate and manage expectations to Customers
• Agree content and plan for the Release with Change Management
• Implement new software releases or hardware into the operational environment
• Ensure that master copies of all software are secured in the Definitive Software Library and that the configuration Management Database (CMDB) is updated.
  

Configuration Management is a central component when implementing ITIL as the other ITIL processes come into close contact with it.  It provides a logical model of the infrastructure or a service by identifying, controlling, maintaining and verifying the versions of Configuration Items (CI) in existence.

It is a key discipline for software developers, IT service providers and managers as it provides a direct control over IT assets.

The main goals of Configuration Management are:

Identification - all IT assets and configurations have to be identified and represented in a Configuration Management Database (CMDB).

Control  - the record of CIs has to be agreed and frozen with Changes only taking place with the agreement of the appropriate authorities.  All CI's must be brought under change control.

Status accounting - recording and reporting the current and historical status of each CI

Verification - reviewing and auditing to ensure that all CIs conform to records in the CMDB