Service Transition

Question 1

What is service transition?

Answer 1

Service transition is the third part of the ITIL “lifecycle”. It encompasses all activities that involve the build-up to deployment or retirement of service changes or services themselves.

Question 2

What is the purpose of service transition?

Answer 2

Service transition exists to ensure that new, modified or retired services meet the requirements of the business, as documented in the service strategy, and service design stages.

Question 3

What is a release policy?

Answer 3

A release policy is a formalized policy for service transition. This policy should include details for transition, such as numbering/naming conventions, software assets, management approaches, and so on.

Question 4

What is transition planning and support?

Answer 4

Transition planning and support is the process of planning all service transition processes and coordinating the resources that they would require.

Question 5

What is service asset and configuration management?

Answer 5

Service asset and configuration management (SACM) is the process of managing assets vital to the operation of the customer’s or organization’s business. Its goal is to ensure that these assets are well-managed and reliable when they are needed.

Question 6

Define configuration item.

Answer 6

A configuration item (CI) is any component or other service asset that needs to be managed in order to deliver an IT service. Each CI has its own information recorded within the configuration management system (CMS). CIs all fall under the jurisdiction of change management. Basically, a CI can be most anything.

Question 7

What are some varieties of configuration items?

Answer 7

There are many examples of configuration items:

• Service Lifecycle CIs: Business cases, service plans, etc.
• Service CIs: Service capability assets, service resource assets, etc.
• Organization CIs: Business strategy or governance
• Internal CIs: Hardware and software required to deliver & maintain services & infrastructure
• External CIs: External customer requirements & agreements, releases from suppliers or sub-contractors, etc
• Interface CIs: Escalation documents & Interface agreements

Question 8

Define configuration management system.

Answer 8

A configuration management system is a set of tools, data, and information that is used to support service asset and configuration management. It maintains information about CIs and their relationships to one another. It’s a part of the service knowledge management system (SKMS).

Question 9

Where are configuration item records stored?

Answer 9

Configuration item records are stored in configuration management databases, which is inside the change management system.

Question 10

Define definitive media library.

Answer 10

A definitive media library is one or more locations in which the definitive and authorized versions of all software configuration items (CI)s are securely stored. It generally also contains documentation and licences (also are CIs).

Question 11

What is change management?

Answer 11

Change management is the process of controlling changes to deliver early realization of benefits with minimum risk.

Question 12

Define change.

Answer 12

A change is the addition, modification, or removal of anything that could have an effect on IT services.

Question 13

Define request for change (RFC).

Answer 13

A request for change is a formal proposal for a change to be made. It includes details of the proposed change.

Question 14

Define change record.

Answer 14

A change record is a record containing the details of a change. Each change record contains details of the lifecycle of a single change. These records are created for every request for change, regardless of if it’s rejected or approved. Change records should always reference the configuration items it references.

Question 15

What are the different types of change.

Answer 15

The different types of change are:

• Normal Change
• Standard Change
• Emergency Change

Question 16

What is a normal change?

Answer 16

A normal change is a change that goes through the full assessment, authorization, and implementation stages. Normal changes are classified as major, significant, or minor.

Question 17

What is a standard change?

Answer 17

A standard change is a pre-approved change that is low-risk, relatively common, and follows a procedure or work instruction, like a password reset, or provision of standard equipment to a new employee. Every standard change has a change model that defines the steps to follow, including how it should be logged, managed, and implemented.

Question 18

What are the elements of a standard change?

Answer 18

The elements of a standard change are:

• A trigger to initiate
• The task is well-known, documented, and proven
• Authority is given in advance
• Budget approval is already given
• The risk is low and well-understood

Question 19

What is an emergency change?

Answer 19

An emergency change is a change category reserved only for highly critical changes that must be implemented ASAP. These are rarely required, and should be designed carefully and tested as much as possible before use. Details of emergency changes may be documented retroactively.

Question 20

What happens to change proposals once they are created?

Answer 20

Once created, a change proposal is submitted to change management, where resource allocation is considered. Once this is approved, the change can be “chartered”, allowing it to begin design.

Question 21

How are change proposals created?

Answer 21

Change proposals are generally created by the service portfolio management process. In some cases, they can also be created by program management offices, or individual projects.

Question 22

What should be included in a change request?

Answer 22

A change request should include:

• A high-level description of the new, changed, or retired service, including business outcomes to be supported, and utility and warranty to be provided.
• A full business case.
• An outline schedule for design and implementation.

Question 23

What is a change model?

Answer 23

A change model is a set of predefined steps that should be taken to handle a particular type of change in an agreed way.

Question 24

What is included in a change model?

Answer 24

A change model generally includes:

• The steps needed to handle the change, including - possible issues, the order they should take, and dependencies.
• Responsibilities: who should do what
• Timescales & thresholds for completion
• Escalation procedures

Question 25

What is remediation planning?

Answer 25

Remediation planning is the process of creating a “back-out” plan for a change, generally through a reloading of a baselined set of configuration items.

Question 26

What is a change advisory board?

Answer 26

A change advisory board is a body that exists to support the authorization of changes and to assist change management in assessing, prioritizing, and scheduling changes.

Question 27

What is an emergency change advisory board?

Answer 27

An emergency change advisory board is a change advisory board that is convened when there is no time to convene a full change advisory board.

Question 28

What is release and deployment management?

Answer 28

Release and deployment management is the process of delivering new required functionality while protecting the integrity of existing services. This involves planning and scheduling the building, testing, and deployment of releases.

Question 29

Define release.

Answer 29

A release is a collection of one or more changes to an IT service that are built, tested, and deployed together. A single release may include changes to hardware, software, documentation, processes, or other components.

Question 30

How many phases are there in release and deployment management, and what are they?

Answer 30

There are four phases in release and deployment management. They are:

1. Release & deployment planning
2. Release build & test
3. Deployment
4. Review & close

Question 31

What is release & deployment planning?

Answer 31

Release & deployment planning is the planning for the creation and deployment of the release, and a part of release & deployment management. This phase starts with change management authorization to plan a release, and ends with change management authorization to create the release.

Question 32

What is release build & test?

Answer 32

Release build & test is part of release & deployment management. In this phase, the release package is built, tested, and checked into the Definitive Media Library. This phase starts with authorization to build the release, and ends with authorization for the package to be checked into the DML.

Question 33

What is a Definitive Media Library?

Answer 33

A Definitive Media Library is a location where the definitive and authorized versions of all software configuration items are securely stored.

Question 34

What is deployment?

Answer 34

Deployment is part of the release & deployment management phase, wherein the release package is deployed to the live environment. This starts with authorization to deploy to one or more environments, and ends with handover to support.

Question 35

What is review & close?

Answer 35

Review & close is a part of the release & deployment management phase, where experience and feedback are gathered, performance targets and achievements are reviewed, lessons learned, etc.

Question 36

What is knowledge management?

Answer 36

Knowledge management is the process of sharing service perspectives, ideas, experience, whatnot in a way that might improve service efficiency and enable informed decisions. The scope of this is that of the entire lifecycle.

Question 37

Define data.

Answer 37

Data is a set of discrete facts about events.

Question 38

Define information.

Answer 38

Information is data with context.

Question 39

Define knowledge.

Answer 39

Knowledge is composed of the tacit experiences, ideas, insights, values, and judgments of individuals.

Question 40

Define wisdom.

Answer 40

Wisdom is the use of knowledge to make well-reasoned decisions.

Question 41

Define Service Knowledge Management System.

Answer 41

A service knowledge management system is a set of tools and databases that is used to manage knowledge, information, and data. This includes the configuration management system, among other databases and systems.