ITIL® , the best practice framework for IT Service management- by the time it has evolved into its third version or as it is called now into the 2007 edition - came up with a comprehensive definition of “Service” (the same is retained in its 2011 edition as well):
“Means of delivering value to the customer by facilitating the outcomes customer want to achieve, without the ownership of specific costs and risks”
However, it seems to be still unclear (or missing the opportunity) in defining ‘IT service’ and ‘IT Service Provider’ clearly. As per the 2011 edition, the definitions are:
“IT service: Services delivered by an IT Service Provider”
“IT Service Provider: A service provider providing IT Services to internal or external customers”
Talk about Circular references!
Can’t we have some better definition or at least better insights into understanding what an ‘IT Service’ is?
No, I don’t have a well thought out definition of ‘IT Service’ on offer here; not yet. However here are some thoughts that might lead us to defining ‘IT service’ better:
What is Information Technology (IT)?
Technology used to: Process information, Store Information, Transfer information, or Present (visualize, for example) business information.
So the ‘outcome’ expected by customer or business from “IT” (as a provider of service) can be described through:
- Process, Store, Transfer or Present business information as required by the business
- While ensuring key aspects like Reliability, Security and Cost-effectiveness
Any systems/technology and/or activity which facilitate the above outcome described above,
- Without the need of business/customer to own, manage or worry about the specific risks and costs of the underlying technology, assets, activities etc.
can be an “IT Service”.
With this context , one possible perspective of looking at IT Service can be as below:
When considering the 3-types of IT Services that ITIL talks about (I have discussed that in an earlier post) – this definition will fittingly apply to the following two types of Service defined by ITIL:
- External Customer facing Services
- Internal customer facing Services
An IT Service Provider like Internal IT Department will have a definition of Service similar to the one explained above.
In the third scenario – Supporting Services, the above definition might not fit in as the focus “outcome” changes there to underlying IT activities and systems and not (directly)on Business information. There activities become more specific to IT internally, like:
- Monitoring of servers, network etc
- Administration of Server, Network device
- Maintenance of Hardware
- Execution of an IT process or activity etc.
But an outsourcing provider (like an Infrastructure management provider, support service provider etc) will align with the latter.
We had an extensive discussion on the same on the ITSkeptic blog on whether the ‘Supporting Services’ should be called IT Services or not. I supported the view of ‘Supporting services’ be included in ‘IT Services’. But trying to define the ‘IT Service’ gives me further thoughts such as:
Won’t it be a better idea to have the services provided by an IT Provider into two broad categories?
- IT Services
- IT Management or IT Support Services
IT Services will include:
A. External Customer facing Services
B. Internal Customer facing Services
IT Management Services will be:
C. Supporting Services
So the Providers also become:
- IT Service Provider or
- IT Management Provider or IT Support Service Provider.
Rest of the Service Management concepts of the framework will be equally applicable in both the cases.
Other perspective on this is :
Since even these supporting services are also (indirectly) supporting the business outcome related to Business information, even those can be included in the ‘IT Service’ category itself.
Any further or different thoughts on the same?
December 6, 2011 at 4:39 pm
Good article. Not a response I’ve spent a lot of time thinking about but…
1. I can see a differentiator between Services and Supporting Services, and I think that is fairly well defined.
2. I can also see differentiators between Internal and Customer facing
3. Do we need to (over)define the differentiator between Services and IT Services, both in real-life and especially in ITIL?
Can we name enough services in real life (outside of the ITIL text) that DON’T rely on IT in some sort? I can name just one or two.
December 8, 2011 at 3:24 pm
Simon, Thanks.
I am very clear about the differentiator betweenSupporting, Internal and External Customer facing services – and im my previous blog, I have high-lighted this as a major plus in ITIL 2011.
Now coming to over-definition, I am not concerned about a definition statement- but I am concerned about clarity of the term “IT Service” as different from “business service” or “non-IT service”.
Question is not whether a Service is relying on IT or not – most of the services do. However that doesn’t make them IT Service, in my opinion.
- Banking Service is hugely dependent on IT – but wont call it IT service
- Hotels Service (lodging) might be dependent on IT to some extent – but still not an IT Service
- Courier service, Transport service etc etc… You can think of numerous other ‘Services’ that will not fall under the category of “IT Services”.
Now how do we differentiate IT Service from these? ITIL is not clear here. Not having a clarity here can confuse IT Services with IT Systems/infrastructure/activities.
Now, is there a need for differentiating between “Service” general and “IT Serivce” ?
Well, no need, as long as ITIL can call itself a best practice framework for “Serivce management” and not “IT Service Management”; if ISO/IEC 20000 becomes a standard for “Service Management” and not for “Information Technology Service Management”.
As long as we scope the domains, frameworks and standards to only “IT Services”, then we need to have clarity on how this is differentiated from “general Service”.
I continue to see conflicts among practitioners, consultants, auditors, trainers etc due to misinterpretation of the word “IT Service”. Most are clear about “Service”.
Hence started with the thought process.
December 8, 2011 at 3:40 pm
Hi Vinod,
Ok, lets flip it around. Rather than asking “Can we identify business services that don’t rely on IT” the question might be “Can we identify IT services that don’t support a business objective”
If we can identify an IT service that doesn’t support a Business outcome, maybe that business should look at it and think “Why am I spending the money!”
Even supporting services that don’t directly support the business (Backup, patching, network) must provide value otherwise whats the point?
I still stand by the idea that there isn’t enough of a distinction to make between a Business Service and an IT Service.
December 8, 2011 at 4:08 pm
Hi Simon,
I agree with that too. All IT Services support business objectives as well. That is not the point of contention here.
Put differently, what I am trying to say is the reverse to what you are arguing here:
Let us take it for a moment that all IT Services can be viewed as business services,as you stated.But from the examples I quoted above, isn’t clear that all business services are NOT IT services?
If we can agree on that, there should be some factor(s) that needs to be there, to call some thing an IT Service, that differentiate a general Service. What is that (are those)? How do we set clarity on that?
That is where there is need for defining IT Services correctly.
December 6, 2011 at 6:42 pm
I agree with Simon: do we really need to over-define? Defining the IT service differently from a service in general would mean they are conceptually different. This could have been true in the past when IT and business run somehow separately and the definition of service was related to the delivery of human activity rather than products. But nowadays IT has reached the heart of the business: is there a business without IT? I could imagine only craftsmen and artists working directly on the material and delivering to people directly in their workshops. So my opinion is that we should consider “IT” only as an attribute indicating the field of application of the service. But I agree that circular references are disappointing: I would left unchanged the definition of IT service provider, while changing the one of IT service into a “service aimed to properly manage the functionality of the IT infrastructure” or something similar.
December 8, 2011 at 3:01 pm
Thanks for a great article and for the beautiful circular reference. Examples like this show us all why the ITIL books should be placed in the circular file:)
The definition of service has been bugging me some while. I think there are many services that do not fit into the ITIL definition or many other definitions. Infrastructure services are often invisible to the customer. There is no contact, no customer involvement and the service does not free one from the ownership of specific costs and risks.
All security, backup, continuity etc. services are like this. They are very important but the best option is that they are never used. Business owns the systems and the information and that is where the risks are. It does not matter who owns the hardware, its value is insignificant.
I think that the service concept can be misleading. People start to think that the service contact is the key while it is just one feature. I think the real point in service is capability and that is where IT services often fail.
IT services are different. I don’t believe that there is much point in talking about general Service Management or; it is like talking about general manufacturing principles.
December 8, 2011 at 3:06 pm
@aalem – Doesn’t the concept of a supporting service (Service A is only possible because of Service B and Service C) cover that for you?
Great point about the circular reference, there must be a ton more in the ITIL books.
December 8, 2011 at 6:24 pm
Simon
I’m not sure. Service A might be somebody else’s service that provider of C&B is supporting.
December 9, 2011 at 10:05 pm
Every service has a customer. But we need to stop thinking that customer is always the business. A suporting service’s customer may be other parts of the IT department.
But I definitely agree that if a servie of any kinf anot be realted ultimately up the chain to adding value to the business, it needs to go!