Service Support – Incident

Management
Incident Management

Incident Management is to restore a normal service operation

as quickly as possible, and to minimize the adverse impact on

business operations, thus ensuring that the best possible levels
of service quality and availability are maintained.

'Normal service operation' is defined here as service operation within Service Level
Agreement (SLA). It is one process area within the broader ITIL environment.

104
 Service Support – Incident
Management

ITIL terminology defines an incident as:

Any incident, or an event, which is not part of the

standard operation of a service and which causes, or
may cause, an interruption to, or a reduction in, the
quality of that service.

In a word, the stated ITIL objective is to restore

normal operations as quickly as possible with
the least possible impact on either the business
or the user, at a cost-effective price.
Source: ITIL Incident Management - The ITIL Open Guide 105
 Service Support – Incident Management

Data about an incident

Reporter of the incident Incident ID

Name, user ID Date, time
Phone number Status
Department Effect, severity, priority
Department number Service Level
Affected person

Affected system Problem editor

Inventory number, CI ID Transfer to
Class/ type/ model Performed actions
Solution
Symptom description Date, time
Category Category
Free text description History

Source: IBM ITIL foundation Student Notebook, IBM Certified Course Material

106 © 2007 IBM

Service Support – Incident
Management

Incident Management

The main processes in

incident management are:

Incident detection and

recording

Classification and initial

support

Investigation and
diagnosis

Resolution and recovery

Incident closure

Incident ownership,
monitoring, tracking and
communication
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 Service Support – Incident Management

Industrial Experience of Incident management (how IBM do)

Incident Mgt is always integrated with Service Desk.

 BMC Remedy

 IBM Tivoli (Maximo)

Source:
BMC Remedy Service Management
http://www.bmc.com/products/products_services_detail/0,,0_0_0_801,00.html
Incident management from IBM
http://www-03.ibm.com/industries/chemicalspetroleum/doc/content/solution/983712220.html
108 © 2007 IBM
Event Console & Service Desk Integration - Demo Scenario
5. Manually synchronized 7. Analyst
BMC
change process closes ticket
Remedy
Service
Desk
4. Incident
3. Trouble ticket analysis Tivoli
automatically TEP Provisioning
CCMDB
opened G ateway Validate Manager
Change History Incident
Netcool/OMNIbus

2. ITM 6. Executes workflows to add

detects ITM TADDM storage space to filesystem
the event Display
Application
topology

1. Filesystem Source:
low-on-space tss@de.ibm.com,
occurs
Tivoli Demo Library,
http://depot.tivlab.raleigh
Composite Application .ibm.com/
109 © 2007 IBM
Major Components
BMC Remedy Service Desk IBM Tivoli Netcool OMNIbus IBM Tivoli Monitorning

IBM Tivoli Directory

Integrator
Tivoli Integrated
Tivoli Integrated IBM Tivoli Provisioning Manager
Demo
Demo
Environment
Environment

IBM TADDM
Domain Manager
IBM TADDM

Configuration
Management
Database

110 © 2007 IBM

2
 Service Support –Incident Management

 Event Console & Service Desk Integration – Demo Demo Script

111 © 2007 IBM

 Service Support -- Problem Management

Problem Management
Problem Management investigates the underlying cause
of incidents, and aims to prevent incidents of a similar
nature from recurring. By removing errors, which often
requires a structural change to the IT infrastructure in an
organization, the number of incidents can be reduced
over time.

To sum up

A problem is the unknown, underlying cause of one or more

incidents.

A known error is when the root cause of a problem is known and a

temporary workaround or alternative has been identified.

Known
Error in Incidents Problems RFC
Error Solutions
Infrastructure

112 © 2007 IBM

Service Support -- Problem
Management
Compare: Incident vs. Problem Management
The main difference between Incident
Management and Problem Management, is
that the former deals with fighting symptoms
to incidents, while the latter seeks to remove
the causes of incidents permanently from the
IT infrastructure.

In Incident Management, interaction with customers is

usually reactive, with the main objective being to find a
workaround solution to restore normal services for the
customer as soon as possible.

In Problem Management, IT support staff are more proactive

as they dedicate resources to establishing the underlying
causes of incidents. There is usually little or no interaction with
the customers, as this is left to the responsibility of the Service 113
Desk.
 Service Support -- Problem
Management

The role of Problem Mgt. in ITIL framework

The basis for the ITIL approach to service management is interrelated activities.
When working toward ITIL best practices the organization becomes more customer oriented.
114
Service Support -- Problem
Management

115
 Service Support -- Problem
Management

Problem Control: Identifying Problems
 Reactive or Proactive- Concerned with identifying the real underlying causes of
incidents in order to prevent future occurrences.

Three phases:

Problem identification & recording

Problem classification

Problem investigation & diagnosis

116
 Service Support -- Problem
Management
Problem Control: Getting at the Root Cause

Three types of Causes

Presumptive cause (s): a cause that may be apparent at the beginning of the
investigation or that emerges in the data collection process. Needs validation.

Contributing cause (s): a cause that alone would not have caused the problem
but is important enough to be recognized as needing corrective action.

Root Cause: the most basic reason for a problem, which, if corrected will prevent
recurrence of that problem.

Techniques
Ishikawa diagrams (Fishbone)
5 Whys
Kepner and Tregoe

117
Service Support -- Problem
Management
The Complete Picture

118
Source: IBM ITIL foundation Student Notebook, IBM Certified Course Material
 IT Service
Management
Questions • Answer • Communication

Tea Break

Foundations in IT service Management

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