ISO 20000 IT Service Continuity Management Process Template

What is IT service continuity management?

IT Service continuity management is a process within ISO 20000 that helps organizations ensure that their IT services can be recovered and restored during an incident. This process includes developing plans, procedures, and arrangements to ensure that essential IT services can be recovered and restored following an incident.

The goal of IT service continuity management is to minimize the disruption to IT services caused by an incident and to ensure that the organization can continue to operate effectively. This process is essential for organizations that rely heavily on IT services, as an outage can significantly impact their business.
IT Service continuity management plans should be developed for all potential incidents disrupting IT services. These plans should detail the steps that need to be taken to recover the affected services and should be regularly tested to ensure they are effective.
Organizations should also have procedures in place to deal with any incidents. These procedures should be designed to minimize the incident's impact and ensure that essential services can be recovered and restored as quickly as possible.

The process of IT service continuity management typically includes the following steps:

1. Identifying the organization's critical services and systems.
2. Establishing acceptable levels of service for those critical services and systems.
3. Develop plans for how those services and systems can be recovered during an interruption.
4. Testing those recovery plans to ensure they are effective.
5. Updating the recovery plans regularly to reflect changes in the organization's IT infrastructure.

Organizations implementing ISO 20000 can use the standard's continuity management requirements to guide their continuity planning.

ITSCM Objectives :

ITSCM aims to ensure that all IT services are delivered reliably and consistently while minimizing the risk of service disruptions. To achieve this, ITSCM must identify, track, and manage IT infrastructure and service changes.
1. To identify all IT infrastructure and service changes and classify them according to their potential impact on service quality.
2. To determine the required approval level for each change type based on its potential impact.
3. To track and monitor all changes throughout the lifecycle, from initiation through to implementation and closure.
4. Ensure that all changes are properly documented and that the resulting documentation is accurate and up to date.
5. To assess the risks associated with each change and to implement mitigation measures to minimize the potential for problems.
6. Ensure that all changes are controlled and consistent, minimizing the risk of service disruptions.
7. To review the effectiveness of the change management process regularly and make improvements where necessary.

The ITSCM process :

ISO 20000 is the first international standard for Service Management. It was developed in 2005 by ISO/IEC JTC1/SC7 and revised in 2011. This standard is based on the widely adopted ITIL® framework and provides a comprehensive set of processes for Service Management.

There are four distinct processes in ISO 20000:

1. Service Strategy
2. Service Design
3. Service Transition
4. Service Operation

Each process is further divided into several activities, which are carried out to achieve the process's objectives.

Here is a brief overview of each process:

Service Strategy: -
The Service Strategy process is concerned with the definition of the services that the organization will provide and identifying the customers who will use those services.

Service Design: -
The Service Design process is concerned with the design of the services that the organization will provide. This includes the creation of new services and the modification of existing services.

Service Transition: -
The Service Transition process involves transitioning new or modified services into the live environment. This includes planning and coordinating the transition, testing, and validating the new or changed services.

Service Operation: -
The Service Operation process is concerned with the operation of the organization's services. This includes monitoring and controlling the services and incident and problem management.

Continual Service Improvement: -
The Continual Service Improvement process is concerned with improving the organization's services. This includes the identification of opportunities for improvement, as well as the implementation of improvements.

ITSCM roles and responsibilities

Several roles and responsibilities must be defined to implement ISO 20000 effectively. The aim is to ensure that everyone involved understands their role and responsibilities within the organization and the expectations placed on them. Here are some of the critical roles and responsibilities that need to be considered:

• The Service Provider: responsible for delivering the agreed-upon services to the customer. This includes ensuring that the services meet the required levels of quality and are delivered within the agreed timeframe.

• The Customer: responsible for defining their service requirements and working with the service provider to meet these needs.

• The Service Manager: responsible for overseeing the delivery of the services and ensuring that they meet the required levels of quality. They also need to be available to resolve any issues that may arise.

• The Service Desk: responsible for the first line of support for the services. They need to be able to deal with any incidents or problems that may occur and escalate them to the right team if necessary.

• The Technical Teams: responsible for designing, implementing, and maintaining the technical infrastructure that supports the services. This includes ensuring the systems are up-to-date and compliant with the organization’s standards.

• The Operations Teams: responsible for the day-to-day running of the services. This includes monitoring the systems for issues and ongoing maintenance, such as application deployments and database updates. They are also the staff responding to issues affecting the services once they have been alerted via the incident forms.

• The Project Leaders: responsible for the services when the Operations team is not working, especially at weekends and during update windows. This will consist of on-call support in case of any issues during these periods, in addition to carrying out maintenance tasks. Along with all operations staff, they have also input into this document as they are the team most closely connected with the services and their users.

Benefits of ITSCM

• ITSCM helps ensure that all services are appropriately managed and controlled throughout their life cycles, from design and planning to delivery and retirement.
• ITSCM can help organizations improve the quality of their services and manage service disruptions better when they occur.
• ITSCM can help organizations more effectively manage costs associated with their IT services by allowing them to plan better and control service-related expenditures.
• Implementing ITSCM in ISO 20000 can also help organizations meet their compliance obligations concerning service management.