Application Management generic activities

Optimize

In the Optimize phase, the results of the Service Level performance measurements are measured, analysed and acted upon. Possible improvements are discussed and development s initiated if necessary. The two main strategies in this phase are to maintain and/or improve the Service Level s and to lower cost. This could lead to iteration in the lifecycle or to justified retirement of an application.

One important thing to remember about the Application Management Lifecycle is that, because it is circular, the same application can reside in different phases of the lifecycle at the same time. For example, when the next version of an application is being designed, and the current version is being deployed, the previous version might still be in operation in parts of an organization. This obviously requires strong version, configuration and release control.

Particular phases might take longer or seem more significant than others, but they are all crucial. Every application must go through all of them at least once and, because of the circular nature of the lifecycle, will go through some more than once.

This approach also supports iterative development approaches, where software is continually being developed in incremental steps. Each step follows the lifecycle and the application is built in increments, using business priorities as a driver.

Good communication is the key as an application works its way through the phases of the lifecycle. It is critical that high- quality information is passed along by those handling the application in one phase of its existence to those handling it in the next phase. It is also important that an organization monitors the quality of the Application Management Lifecycle. Changes in the lifecycle, for example in the way an organization passes information between the different phases, will affect its quality. Understanding the characteristics of every phase in the Application Management Lifecycle is crucial to improving the quality of the whole. Methods and tools used in one phase might have an impact on others, while optimization of one phase might sub-optimize the whole.

While most Application Management teams or departments are dedicated to specific application s or sets of applications, there are a number of activities which they have in common. These include:

• Identifying the knowledge and expertise required to manage and operate applications in the delivery of IT service s. This process starts during the Service Strategy phase, is expanded in detail in Service Design and is executed in Service Operation. Ongoing assessment and updating of these skills are done during Continual Service Improvement.
• Initiating training programme s to develop and refine the skills in the appropriate Application Management resource s and maintaining training record s for these resource s.
• Recruiting or contracting resource s with skills that cannot be developed internally, or where there are insufficient people to perform the required Application Management activities.
• Design and delivery of end- user training. Training may be developed and delivered by either the Application Development or Application Management groups, or by a third party, but Application Management is responsible for ensuring that training is conducted as appropriate.
• Insourcing for specific activities where the required skills are not available internally or in the open market, or where it is more cost-efficient to do so.
• Definition of standard s used in the design of new architectures and participation in the definition of application architecture s during the Service Strategy processes.
• Research and Development of solutions that can help expand the Service Portfolio or which can be used to simplify or automate IT Operations, reduce cost s or increase levels of IT service.
• Involvement in the design and building of new services. All Application Management teams or departments will contribute to the design of the Technical Architecture and Performance standards for IT Services. In addition they will also be responsible for specifying the operational activities required to manage applications on an ongoing basis.
• Involvement in project s, not only during the Service Design process, but also for Continual Service Improvement or operational projects, such as Operating System upgrades, server consolidation projects or physical moves.
• Designing and performing tests for the functionality, performance and manageability of IT Services (bearing in mind that testing should be controlled and performed by an independent tester – see Service Transition publication).
• Availability and Capacity Management are dependent on Application Management for contributing to the design of applications to meet the levels of service required by the business. This means that modelling and workload forecasting are often done together with Technical and Application Management resources.
• Assistance in assessing risk, identifying critical service and system dependencies and defining and implementing countermeasure s.
• Managing vendors. Many Application Management departments or groups are the only ones who know exactly what is required of a vendor and how to measure and manage them. For this reason, many organizations rely on Application Management to manage contract s with vendors of specific application s. If this is the case it is important to ensure that these relationship s are managed as part of the SLM process.
• Involvement in definition of Event Management standard s and especially in the instrumentation of applications for the generation of meaningful event s.
• Application Management as a function provides the resource s that execute the Problem Management process. It is their technical expertise and knowledge that is used to diagnose and resolve problem s. It is also their relationship with the vendors that is used to escalate and follow up with vendor support teams or departments.
• Application Management resources will be involved in defining coding systems that are used in Incident and Problem Management (e.g. Incident Categories).
• Application Management resources are used to support Problem Management in validating and maintaining the KEDB together with the Application Development teams.
• Change Management relies on the technical knowledge and expertise to evaluate changes and many changes will be built by Application Management teams.
• Successful Release Management is dependent on involvement from Application Management staff. In fact they are frequently the driver s of the Release Management process for their applications.
• Application Management will define, manage and maintain attribute s and relationships of application CIs in the CMS.
• Application Management is involved in the Continual Service Improvement processes, particularly in identifying opportunities for improvement and then in helping to evaluate alternative solutions.
• Application Management ensures that all system and operating documentation is up to date and properly utilized. This includes ensuring that all design, management and user manuals are up to date and complete and that Application Management staff and users are familiar with their contents.
• Collaboration with Technical Management on performing Training Needs Analysis and maintaining Skills Inventories.
• Assisting IT Financial Management to identify the cost of the ongoing management of applications.
• Involvement in defining the operational activities performed as part of IT Operations Management. Many Application Management departments, groups or teams also perform the operational activities as part of an organization ’s IT Operations Management function.
• Input into, and maintenance of, software configuration policies.
• Together with Software Development teams, the definition and maintenance of documentation related to applications. These will include user manuals, administration and management manuals, as well as any SOPs required to manage operational aspects of the application.

Application Management teams or departments will be needed for all key applications. The exact nature of the role will vary depending upon the applications being supported, but generic responsibilities are likely to include:

• Third-level support for incidents related to the application(s) covered by that team or department
• Involvement in operation testing plan s and deployment issues
• Application bug tracking and patch management (coding fixes for in-house code, transports/patches for third-party code)
• Involvement in application operability and supportability issues such as error code design, error messaging, event management hooks
• Application sizing and performance; volume metric s and load testing etc. This is in support of Capacity and Availability Management processes
• Involvement in developing Release Policies
• Identification of enhancements to existing software, both from a functionality and manageability perspective.

Дата добавления: 2014-12-23