Improving Service Quality by Implementing
Information Technology Infrastructure Library (ITIL)
Best Practice
Term Paper for BA509 IT Governance
By Prof. Michael Shaw
Ya Tang
Yatang2@uiuc.edu
May 2007
1
Abstract
IT organizations are facing the fundamental issues to justify the value of IT investment.
Adapting a service approach, IT service organizations must manage their customers’
expectations and perceptions and understand who their customers are and what their
needs are. ITIL framework provides the consistent and comprehensive best practices
for IT service management and delivery. ITIL framework focused on service support
and service delivery, which is believed to be one of the best ways to increase service
quality. This paper reviews service quality gap model and SERVQUAL methodology
to evaluate service quality. Praeg and Schnabel (2006)’s assess criteria based on
SERVQUAL approach for ITIL implementation are also discussed for future
applications.
Keywords: ITIL, Service Quality, SERVQUAL approach
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1. Introduction
During the last twenty years, market-based services expanded rapidly and have been
the main driver of productivity and economic growth. Today more and more attention
is paid to the service sector of the economy. The rapid growth has led it to outstrip the
agriculture and industry sectors (Chesbrough and Spohrer 2006). The business goals
of companies are changed from reducing cost to increasing the revenue by providing
better services to the customers (Rust and Kannan 2003).
IT organizations today face fundamental issue relating to the value of, sustainability
of, and satisfaction with information technology. IT organizations within business
today are under increasing pressure to justify the value of IT and reduce IT costs.
External factors are contributing to changing perceptions of the IT organization and
pressure to demonstrate its value. Internal factors such as poor visibility of IT value in
the past has led to poor understanding of what value IT brings to the business and a
need for justification. Many IT organizations today have a stated emphasis on
customer satisfaction and are seeking to transform themselves by becoming more
customer-focused (IBM Global Services 2001).
Under such circumstances, service quality becomes one of the most important
problems for IT organizations today. Service quality has been reported to be
significantly related to costs, profitability, customer satisfaction, customer retention,
behavior intention, and positive word-of-mouth communications (Cronin and Taylor
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1992). IT organizations face the problems of how to improve service quality and how
to measure the service quality.
The Information Technology Infrastructure Library (ITIL) is a framework of best
practice approaches intended to facilitate the delivery of high quality information
technology services. ITIL outlines an extensive set of management procedures that are
intended to support businesses in achieving the service quality and value in IT
operations. ITIL is believed to be one of the best ways for IT organizations to improve
service quality.
The remainder of the paper is structured as follow. In Section 2, I reviewed the nine
processes in ITIL framework. The focused attentions are paid to the service support
and service delivery processes. Further I reviewed the literature in services and
service quality. A service quality model is also examined in section 3. In section 4, I
examined the SERVQUAL methodology and discussed Praeg and Schnabel (2006)’s
assess criteria to measure service quality of implementing ITIL framework. Finally,
related discussion and suggestions for future research are presented in Section 5.
2. ITIL Framework
One of the major challenges facing Chief Information Officers (CIOs) is aligning IT
with business strategy and processes. In today’s competitive environment, individual
IT processes must now share knowledge in a systematic and standardized way.
4
Information Technology Infrastructure Library (ITIL) is helping to drive the
convergence of information management and knowledge management through
processes, databases and organizational structures. Developed by the U.K. Office of
Government Commerce (OGC), the ITIL is an important ingredient in building the
enterprise of the future (Murray and Mohamed 2007). ITIL establishes the best
practice approaches intended to facilitate the delivery of high quality IT services. In
addition, ITIL provides the guidance for companies to build management procedures
to support businesses in achieving both quality and value, in a financial sense, in IT
operations (Wiki ITIL). IT service management is a subsection of ITIL framework.
Service Management is the management of service producing industries, in contrast to
manufacturing and agricultural industries. Since the term Service Management is
most widely used as the component of Operations Support Systems responsible for
service delivery and service support, it is also called as Information Technology
Service Management (ITSM). Contrast to previous technology focused approaches to
IT management and cost reduction, IT service management focused on the customers’
perspective of IT contribution to the business. It is quoted in the IT service
management literature that “providers of IT services can no longer afford to focus on
technology and their internal organization, they now have to consider the quality of
the services they provide and focus on the relationship with customers” (IT Service
Management Forum 2002) .
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Figure 1 ITIL Framework (Source: Office of Government Commerce)
2.1 Service Support
The two major components of IT Service Management in ITIL are service support and
service delivery, which are by far most widely used. The Service Support discipline is
“focused on the User of the ICT services and is primarily concerned with ensuring
that they have access to the appropriate services to support the business functions”
(Wiki ITIL). The discipline consists of the following processes:
Service Desk is focused on incident control and keeping the customer informed of
progress and advising on workarounds. Service desk not only handles incidents,
problems and questions but also provides an interface for other service activities
(Wiki, ITIL).
Incident Management is to “restore a normal service operation as quickly as possible
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and to minimize the impact on business operations, thus ensuring that the best
possible levels of service quality and availability are maintained” (Wiki, ITIL).
Problem Management is to “resolve the root cause of incidents and thus to minimize
the adverse impact of incidents and problems on business that are caused by errors
within the IT infrastructure, and to prevent recurrence of incidents related to these
errors” (Wiki, ITIL).
Configuration Management is a process that “tracks all of the individual
Configuration Items (CI) in an IT system which may be as simple as a single server,
or as complex as the entire IT department” (Wiki, ITIL).
Change Management is to “ensure that standardized methods and procedures are
used for efficient handling of all Changes, in order to minimize the impact of
Change-related incidents and to improve day-to-day operations” (Wiki, ITIL).
Release Management is used for platform-independent and automated distribution of
software and hardware, including license controls across the entire IT infrastructure
(Wiki, ITIL).
2.2 Service Delivery
The Service Delivery discipline is primarily “concerned with the proactive and
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forward-looking services that the business requires of its ICT provider in order to
provide adequate support to the business users. It is focused on the business as the
customer of the ICT services” (Wiki ITIL). The discipline consists of the following
processes:
Service Level Management provides for “continual identification, monitoring and
review of the levels of IT services specified in the Service Level Agreements (SLAs)”
(Wiki, ITIL). Service Level Management ensures that arrangements are in place with
internal IT support providers and external suppliers.
Capacity Management supports the “optimum and cost effective provision of IT
services by helping organizations match their IT resources to the business demands”
(Wiki, ITIL). The high-level activities are Application Sizing, Workload Management,
Demand Management, Modeling, Capacity Planning, Resource Management, and
Performance Management.
IT Service Continuity Management helps to ensure the availability and rapid
restoration of IT services in the event of a disaster (Wiki, ITIL). The high level
activities are Risk Analysis, Contingency Plan Management, Contingency Plan
Testing, and Risk Management.
Availability Management allows organizations to sustain the IT service availability
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in order to support the business at a justifiable cost (Wiki, ITIL). The high-level
activities are Realize Availability Requirements, Compile Availability Plan, Monitor
Availability, and Monitor Maintenance Obligations.
Financial Management is to give accurate and cost effective stewardship of IT assets
and resources used in providing IT Services. It is used to plan, control and recover
costs expended in providing the IT Service negotiated and agreed to in the Service
Level Agreement (Wiki, ITIL).
While the Service Support and Service Delivery are by far the most widely used, ITIL
provides a more comprehensive set of practices as a whole, such as Planning To
Implement Service Management, The Business Perspective, Software Asset
Management,
Security
Management,
ICT
Infrastructure
Management,
and
Application Management.
Planning to Implement Service Management deals explicitly with the question of
where to start with ITIL. It outlines the steps necessary to identify how the
organization would benefit from ITIL. It helps identify current strengths and
weaknesses and gives practical guidance on evaluating current maturity levels of
service management within the organization (Wiki, ITIL).
The Business Perspective is designed to familiarize business management with the
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architecture and components of information and communications technology (ICT)
— infrastructure required to support the business processes. It helps business leaders
better understand the benefits of best practices in IT service management (Wiki,
ITIL).
Software Asset Management encompasses the necessary infrastructure and
processes for effective management, control, and protection of the software assets
within an organization throughout all stages of their life cycle (Wiki, ITIL).
Security Management looks at security from the service provider perspective,
identifying the relationship between security management and the IT security officer,
as well as outlining how ITIL provides the level of security necessary for the entire
organization. It further focuses on the process of implementing security requirements
identified in the IT service-level agreement (Wiki, ITIL).
ICT Infrastructure Management covers all aspects of infrastructure management
from identification of business requirements to acquiring, testing, installing, and
deploying infrastructure components. It includes the design and planning processes,
deployment processes, operations processes, and technical support processes (Wiki,
ITIL).
Application Management addresses the complex subject of managing applications
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from initial business requirements through the application management life cycle, up
to and including retirement. A strong emphasis is placed on ensuring that IT projects
and strategies are tightly aligned with those of the business throughout the
applications’ life cycle. Once an application is approved and funded, it is tracked
throughout its life cycle by the software asset management function of ITIL (Wiki,
ITIL).
3. Services and Service Quality
3.1 Services
Adopting a service approach to IT provide a framework for the IT organizations to
deliver value to its customers. A service is a provider/customer interaction that
generates and captures value. The service provider and customer (i.e., enterprise)
coordinate their work and during the process, both of them are able to reap the benefits
(IBM 2006). Services have four distinguishing characteristics: intangible, inseparable,
variable and perishable.
3.2 Service quality
One that is commonly used defines service quality as the extent to which a service
meets customers’ needs or expectations (Lewis and Mitchell 1990; Wisniewski and
Donnelly 1996). Service quality can thus be defined as the difference between
customer expectations of service and perceived service. If expectations are greater
than performance, then perceived quality is less satisfactory and hence customer
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dissatisfaction occurs (Parasuraman et al. 1985; Lewis and Mitchell 1990).
Service quality is an abstract and elusive construct. An appropriate approach to assess
and define service quality is to measure customers’ perceived quality (Parasuraman et
al. 1988). In the context of services, perceived service quality refers to the gap
between customers’ expectations and their perceptions of service performance. Figure
2 illustrates the well perceived service quality model.
Figure 2 Model of Service Quality Gaps (Parasuraman et al. 1985; Curry 1999; Luk
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and Layton 2002)
The purpose of gap analysis is to help organizations decide who can improve service
quality. The shorter the gap, the better the service quality. There are seven major gaps
in the service quality concept, which are shown in Figure 1. Gap 1 is the
understanding gap between customers’ expectations and management perceptions,
which is as a result of the lack of a marketing research orientation, inadequate upward
communication and too many layers of management. Gap 2 is the design gap between
management perceptions and service specifications, as a result of inadequate
commitment to service quality, a perception of unfeasibility, inadequate task
standardization and an absence of goal setting. Gap 3 is the management gap between
service specifications and service delivery, as a result of role ambiguity and conflict,
poor employee-job fit and poor technology-job fit, inappropriate supervisory control
systems, lack of perceived control and lack of teamwork. Gap 4 is the external
communication gap between service delivery and external communication, as a result
of inadequate horizontal communications and propensity to over-promise. Gap 5 is
the service quality gap between customer expectations and their perceptions of the
service delivered, as a result of the influences exerted from the customer side and the
shortfalls (gaps) on the part of the service provider. In this case, customer
expectations are influenced by the extent of personal needs, word of mouth
recommendation and past service experiences. Gap 6 is the delivery gap between
customer expectations and employees’ perceptions, as a result of the differences in the
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understanding of customer expectations by front-line service providers. Gap 7 is the
internal communication gap between employee’s perceptions and management
perceptions, as a result of the differences in the understanding of customer
expectations between managers and service providers. The understanding gap (Gap 1),
service quality gap (Gap 5) and delivery gap (Gap 6) are the three important gaps,
which are more associated with the external customers since they have a direct
relationship with customers. According to Brown and Bond (1995), "the gap model is
one of the best received and most heuristically valuable contributions to the services
literature". The model identifies seven key discrepancies or gaps relating to
managerial perceptions of service quality, and tasks associated with service delivery
to customers. The six gaps-understanding gap, management gap, design gap, service
delivery gap, external communication gap, internal communication gap are identified
as functions of the way in which service is delivered, whereas service quality gap
(Gap 5) pertains to the customer and as such is considered to be the true measure of
service quality. In the following section, the SERVQUAL methodology is
demonstrated to have influence in service quality gap.
4. Using SERVQUAL Methodology to Assess Service Quality under
ITIL Framework
One service quality measurement model that has been extensively applied is the
SERVQUAL model developed by Parasuraman et al. (1985, 1988, 1994; Zeithaml et
al., 1990). SERVQUAL as the most often used approach for measuring service quality
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has been to compare customers' expectations before a service encounter and their
perceptions of the actual service delivered (Parasuraman et al., 1985). The
SERVQUAL instrument has been the predominant method used to measure
consumers’ perceptions of service quality. It has five generic dimensions or factors
and is stated as follows: “Tangibles” describes the physical facilities, equipment and
appearance of personnel. How easy to understand communication materials.
“Reliability” demonstrates the service provider’s ability to perform the promised
service dependably and accurately. “Responsiveness” shows the service provider’s
willingness to help customers and provide prompt service. “Assurance” shows the
knowledge and courtesy of employees and their ability to inspire trust and confidence.
“Empathy” concerns caring and individualized attention that the firm provides to its
customers.
Table 1. Quality dimensions (Praeg and Schnabel 2006)
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
SERVQUAL dimensions
Tangibles
Reliability
Responsiveness
Assurance
Empathy
IT-service cachet dimensions
1. Performance specification
2. References
3. Comprehensibility
4. Information to the customer
5. Availability of the service provider
6. Employees
7. Organizational reliability
8. Technical security
9. Economic power
10. Legal aspects
Based on SERVQUAL approach, Praeg and Schnabel (2006) introduces the IT service
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quality framework for IT service management and focuses on a cachet to evaluate IT
service quality. They tailored the IT service cachet dimensions from SERVQUAL
approaches to ten dimensions including performance specification, references,
comprehensibility, information to the customer, availability of the service provider,
employee, organizational reliability, technical security, economic power and legal
aspects (Table 1).
The evaluation catalogue for the IT service cachet contains 48 assessment criteria to
evaluate the quality of IT services. These indicators can be separated into ten
dimensions. They separated these dimensions into three parts. The first part describes
the “thematic and formal requirement of the services”, the second part focuses on the
“communication between service provider and customer” and the third part
concentrate on the characteristics of the “service provider”. In the part “thematic and
formal requirements of the services”, there are three additional dimensions for
assessing the quality measures: performance specification, references and
comprehensibility of the services. In the second part “communication between service
provider and customer”, there are two dimensions: information to the customer and
availability of the service provider. In the third part, “service provider”, there are
following dimensions: employees, organizational reliability, technical reliability,
economic power and legal aspects. Table 2 listed the specific assessment for IT
services under ITIL framework.
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Table 2. Assessment criteria for IT services (Praeg and Schnabel 2006)
Part 1: Thematic and formal requirements
Dimension
Criteria
Performance
− Availability of an ITIL conform service catalogue
specification
− Availability of a offer-specific performance specification
− Existence of a price list of the services
− Comprehensible pricing
− Existence of the SLA contents required in the ITIL
framework
− Existence of a management summary
− Existence of a Company description of the service provider
− Existence of a user adequate statement of the status quo
− Existence of reference to possible risk statements from the
service provider
− No employee-bound definitions of services in the service
offer
Framework conditions and prerequisites of the supply are
−
mentioned
Existence of regulations of dealing with service recipient
−
data
− Availability of a offer validation period
− Existence of employee profiles
− User specific relevant glossary available
References
− Existence of references in the offer
References match the offered service and the line of
−
business
Availability of letter of recommendation and/or success
−
stories
Existence of proof of long- term relations to reference
−
service recipients
Comprehensibil − Uniform terminology within the offer
ity
− Use of abbreviations only according to previous explanation
and description in an available list of abbreviations
All documents in the offer are semantically and
−
linguistically correct
− Required information is up-to- date
Part 2: Communication between service provider and customer
Dimension
criteria
Information to − The service provider indicate time periods for customer
the customer
requests and clarification
− Enquiries from the service recipient would pass within the
service provider as soon as possible
− Existence of regular information of the service recipient
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Availability of
service
provider
−
−
−
Dimension
Employees
−
−
−
−
−
Organizational
reliability
−
−
−
−
−
Technical
security
Economic
power
Legal aspects
−
−
−
−
−
−
−
−
about the processing status of enquiries
The service provider offers fixed contact persons with
corresponding responsibilities
Availability of representative regulation
Documented fixed times of the availability of the service
provider Service provider has a documented escalation matrix
Part 3: Service provider
Criteria
Employee profiles contain corresponding experiences with
regard to line of business and tasks
Availability of performance specific, qualified certificates
Proof of further education courses
Fluctuation rate
Availability of representation of employee profiles of involved
third parties
Documented process management for the offer process
Documented process management for service delivery
Documented proof of an effective management system
Implemented business excellence processes at the service
provider
Documentations of regular supplier assessments with the
service provider
Systematic elevation of customer feedbacks
Existence of behaving rules in cooperation with customers
Documentation of availability management related to IT
infrastructure
Documentation of a continuity management process
Documentation of IT-security
Financial situation of the service provider
Profit situation of the service provider
Documentation and proof of compliance with relevant legal
regulations
5. Discussion and Conclusion
IT organizations are facing the fundamental issues to justify the value of IT
investment. Adapting a service approach, IT service organizations must manage their
customers’ expectations and perceptions and understand who their customers are and
what their needs are. ITIL framework provides the consistent and comprehensive best
18
practices for IT service management and delivery. ITIL framework focused on service
support and service delivery, which is believed to be one of the best ways to increase
service quality.
ITIL best practices allow IT organizations to deliver the optimal service levels to their
customers by balancing the performance and cost of the services with the business
requirements. Relationships between the provider (internal or external) and customer
are also improved through added customer focus and through SLAs allowing both
parties to have a mutual understanding of the requirements and the delivery (Spectrum
2004). Additionally, implementing ITIL best practices makes IT Service Management
more efficient by focusing on delivering the required business services at the agreed
upon service levels and by having well defined processes for performing the required
management tasks. Using the well defined processes and best practices helps
eliminate problems while increasing service levels. ITIL is the one of the best way for
IT organizations to improve service quality.
Based on SERVQUAL methodology, Praeg and Schnabel (2006)’s assessing criteria
provides a helpful tool for IT service users and service providers to evaluate the
quality of the services and an improved level of process quality. The assessing criteria
combine the user and provider needs. Future research can apply Praeg and Schnabel
(2006)’s assessing criteria to evaluate the IT organizations’ service quality and
validate and refine these criteria.
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