Defining IT Services for
the Business
By Reginald Lo
In order to run IT like a business, a technical service and support
organization needs to have a clear picture of the services it provides and
how these services create value for its customers. Many organizations find
it difficult to define services from the customer’s perspective because
they’re used to thinking in terms of systems and technologies. This article
explains how to define end-to-end IT services by analyzing business
capabilities and business processes.
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The Basics
Before one can define IT services,
one must first understand the
different types of services within the
enterprise. Services can be broadly
classified into business services and
IT services. A business service
is a service that the business
provides to external customers; an IT
service is a service that the support
organization (or, more generally, a
service provider) provides to its customers. Those customers may
be internal (i.e., the business) or external (i.e., customers). In the
latter case, there’s often a business department between IT and the
external customer. A supporting service is a service that one
team provides for another; for example, the infrastructure team
might provide hosting services for the application management
team. For the purposes of this article, we will focus on customerfacing services as opposed to supporting services.
Types of Services
External Customers
The business uses capabilities to deliver business services.
Capabilities represent an organization’s ability to coordinate,
control, and deploy resources to produce value. A particular
business capability may be used by multiple business services;
in the banking example below, for instance, both the checking
and savings account service and the credit card service use the
support center business capability.
Business capabilities can be broken down into business processes.
In the banking Generic
example, theModel
most obvious business process for
the support center is handling the customer inquiry. However, the
support center also performs other business processes, such as
shift scheduling (i.e., ensuring the support center is staffed 24×7).
Business
Business Services
External CustomerFacing IT Services
Business
Business-Facing (or Internal
Customer-Facing) IT Services
IT Department
IT Team (e.g., Application Team)
Supporting Services
IT Team (e.g., Infrastructure Team)
According to ITIL, “a service is a means of delivering value
to customers by facilitating outcomes customers want to achieve
without taking on the ownership of specific costs and risks.” And
so, to define IT services, one must first understand the customer’s
desired outcomes. This may seem obvious from the definition of a
service, but many IT departments start by analyzing their systems
and technologies first, instead of customer outcomes. So how do
we do it?
Business
Business
An IT service typically automates a business process and so
Service #1
Service #2
Service #3
should contain all of the necessary components for the successful
execution of that business process. In the banking example,
the IT service that underpins the customer inquiry business
process includes the support center application, the workstation
Businesscenter representative,
Business and the phone system.
used by the support
Capability
#1
Capability
#2
Therefore, by modeling business capabilities
and business
processes, one can define end-to-end IT services that focus on
customer outcomes.
The industry is currently divided on whether IT services should
Businessor business processes.
Business Some argue
mapBusiness
to business capabilities
Process #1
Process #2
Process #3
for the former because it avoids getting too granular and loosing
focus on the big picture (i.e., how IT enables the business). Others,
such as ITIL, advocate for the latter.
IT Serviceas#1
IT Service
#3 capabilities
If your organization
a whole hasn’t defined
its business
or processes, you don’t necessarily have to reinvent the wheel. Be
pragmatic and use whatever is available. For example, enterprise
architecture (EA)—which comprises four interrelated domains:
business, data, application, and technology—may already have
defined business capabilities. Similarly, the business continuity
Services
Generic Mapping
Model Business Services to ITBanking
Example
Banking Example
Generic Model
Business
Service #1
Business
Service #2
Business
Capability #1
Business
Process #1
Checking/Saving
Account Services
Call
Center
Business
Capability #2
Business
Process #2
IT Service #1
Business
Service #3
Credit Card
Services
Mortgage
Services
Customer
Analytics
Business
Process #3
Customer
Inquiry
Shift Scheduling
IT Service #3
Call Center
IT Service
Workforce Management
IT Service
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www.ThinkHDI.com A Professional Journal for the Technical Service and Support Community
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Many people confuse the service catalog and the request
catalog. As mentioned before, a service is an end-to-end
capability that facilitates customer outcomes; many services,
like email, are delivered regularly. A request is transactional;
the customer asks for something, the request is fulfilled,
and then it’s considered to be done. If email is a service, the
requests associated with the email service are typically for new
email accounts, new email distribution groups, expanded email
folder space, etc. Hence, there’s a one-to-many relationship
between services and requests. (In some cases, there may be
a many-to-many relationship. For example, new hire setup
might be a request that spans the desktop service, the email
service, etc.)
The diagram below sketches out the relationship between these
strategic, tactical, and operational tools. These numbers will
vary widely depending on the nature of the business; some
businesses are very focused, while other businesses might have
multiple business units competing in a range of industries.
management (BCM) department may have already inventoried the
business’s processes. If you don’t have access to existing resources,
look to standard, industry-specific frameworks for guidance. The
American Productivity and Quality Center (www.APQC.org), for
example, provides both generic and industry-specific business
process frameworks.
Practical Application
One useful side effect of leveraging work done by EA, BCM, and
other departments is that it helps legitimize a service portfolio/
service catalog initiative as more than just an internal project, one
that is, in fact, critical for aligning IT with the business.
There’s a lot of confusion surrounding the service portfolio,
service catalog, and request fulfillment processes. The service
portfolio is a strategic tool used by IT and business executives
to determine the level of investment the business will make into
each service. The service catalog is a tactical tool used by
IT management to communicate the services the IT organization
currently offers. The request catalog is an operational tool
that enables users to make specific requests of the service desk or
fulfillment team (if it’s a separate function from the service desk).
Service Portfolio vs. Service Catalog
vs. Request Catalog
Service Portfolio + Service Catalog
+ Request Catalog
Portfolio
No more than a dozen,
frequently less
Service
Catalog
Thirty to eighty services
(typically delivered month
after month)
Request
Catalog
More than 100 requests
(transactional)
Email
One to
many
New email account
New email distributor group
Expand folder size
..................................
Before
Business you can run IT like a business, you must first have a
Service understanding
#1
clear
of the services your IT department delivers
and how they provide value for the customer. Defining services
is just one step on the journey, and it doesn’t end there. Once
you’ve defined your organization’s services, the support center
must manage the service portfolio and service catalog, identify
service owners and other key roles, promote cost transparency,
and provide the business with the tools it needs to manage
the trade-offs between cost and quality.
Service Portfolio
Determine level of investment
in each service
Business
Executives
IT
Executives
Service Catalog
Business
Management
Business Users
Communicating and setting expectations:
• What services are available?
• What service level to expect?
• How do I request it?
• What does it cost?
Request Catalog
Channel for
transactional requests
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IT
Management
Service Desk and
Fulfillment Teams
About the Author
Reginald Lo is the vice president of professional
services for Third Sky, an ITSM consulting
company focused on business-driven IT. Reg is
a certified ITIL Expert and has helped hundreds
of organizations adopt ITSM best practices. He
has spoken at HDI and itSMF events and was a
reviewer for the ITIL 2011 edition and TIPA, a
framework for assessing ITIL and ISO/IEC 20000
maturity.