Strategic Service Management: A Service Establishment and Delivery Process Area at Maturity Level 3
Purpose
The purpose of Strategic Service Management (STSM) is to establish and maintain standard services in concert with strategic needs and plans.
Introductory Notes
The Strategic Service Management process area involves the following activities:
• Analyzing capabilities and needs for services that span multiple customers and agreements
• Establishing and maintaining standard services, service levels, and descriptions that reflect these capabilities and needs
Strategic service management processes improve alignment between the set of services offered by a service provider organization and its strategic business objectives. If the organization is small or has a narrow focus, the standard services can consist of a single service or small related group of services. Larger organizations can have a more complex set of standard services.
Active analysis of customer and competitor data, market trends and opportunities, and organizational characteristics such as capabilities and strengths yield information that the organization uses to establish standard services. Standard services are one enabler of consistent service performance across the organization. The objective of this process area is not to manage individual services but to get the information needed to make effective strategic decisions about the set of standard services the organization maintains.
Standard services provide a basis for making the most of the service provider organization’s capabilities to meet its business objectives. Standard services can also improve service quality, business capture, and satisfaction of both customers and end users while reducing costs, errors, and time to develop and deliver services. Standard service levels are a key component of standard services. Service levels make expectations and responsibilities clear, specific, and measurable between the service organization and the customer.
In this process area, when customer needs are mentioned, end-user needs are also implied. The needs of the customer and end user can differ. Both are critical when collecting and analyzing data to develop standard services and understand strategic needs and plans.
Standard services are typically described in a service catalog that is oriented to the information needs of customers. In addition, standard service descriptions oriented to the needs of the service provider organization’s staff can be maintained.
Attention to satisfaction with and use of current services allows the organization to adjust or correct some services and can contribute to planning for future services. The organization can also identify requirements for new service systems or changes to existing systems. These systems can support single or multiple customers.
The specific practices in this process area complement the practices in Organizational Process Definition, Organizational Process Focus, and Organizational Process Performance. In these process areas, the organization defines, improves, and quantitatively understands its standard processes. In contrast, the broader focus of STSM is on services rather than only on service system components that can be processes.
Related Process Areas
Refer to the Incident Resolution and Prevention process area for more information about monitoring the status of incidents to closure.
Refer to the Service Delivery process area for more information about delivering services in accordance with service agreements.
Refer to the Organizational Process Definition process area for more information about establishing standard processes.
Refer to the Requirements Management process area for more information about understanding requirements.
Refer to the Work Monitoring and Control process area for more information about monitoring the work against the plan.
Specific Practices by Goal
SG 1 Establish Strategic Needs and Plans for Standard Services
Strategic needs and plans for standard services are established and maintained.
“Strategic needs” are conditions or objectives in the organization often driven by factors in the environment. An organization may need to increase revenue, profitability, or market share. Customers may need a different or new set of services, or expect a change in an organization’s service offerings based on what competitors are providing or based on shifts in their own objectives. The organization considers the range of needs in light of its capabilities, makes decisions about which objectives to pursue, and reflects these needs and objectives in plans for standard services.
In many organizations, strategic planning information can be proprietary, sensitive, and subject to non-disclosure requirements or other controls. Anyone participating in developing plans for standard services should exercise care in complying with controls to protect sensitive strategic information.
SP 1.1 Gather and Analyze Data
Gather and analyze data about the strategic needs and capabilities of the organization.
The organization gathers and analyzes data that can help with planning the standard services that the organization will establish and maintain. The appropriate data can vary for different services, market segments, and organizational characteristics such as size. The data will offer insights into both the organization’s capabilities and the needs of its market, including customers and end users.
Example Work Products
1. Analyzed data on the organization’s capabilities
2. Analyzed data on strategic needs
3. Descriptions of the organization’s capabilities
4. Descriptions of strategic needs
Subpractices
1. Gather and analyze data on the organization’s capabilities.
2. Gather and analyze data on the organization’s strategic needs.
3. Describe the organization’s capabilities and strategic needs.
4. Communicate the descriptions to relevant stakeholders.
SP 1.2 Establish Plans for Standard Services
Establish and maintain plans for standard services.
Standard service planning translates information about the organization’s capabilities and strategic needs into decisions about standard services. Plans for standard services reflect actions needed to balance capabilities of the organization; strategic needs, including the needs of customers and end users; and the conditions of the competitive market.
Example Work Products
1. Descriptions of strategic business objectives
2. Prospective service descriptions
3. Analysis of service system needs
4. Decision or approval packages for selected services
5. Plans for standard services
Subpractices
1. Confirm strategic business objectives.
Strategic business objectives for a service organization may be explicit and available. If they are not, the planners executing this activity document their understanding of the implicit goals as part of their planning. This understanding should be reviewed and approved by senior management.
2. Recommend requirements for standard services based on strategic business objectives, the organization’s capabilities, and strategic needs.
3. Identify needed actions on standard services.
Needed actions can include development of new standard services, revision or improvement of current standard services, or retirement of standard services. A known failure mode in managing services is inattention to managing the obsolescence of services. Standard services that no longer fit the needs of the organization’s customer or the current capabilities of the organization should be retired or altered so that they do fit. The organization should set priorities and decide on the phasing of actions as appropriate.
Refer to the Organizational Performance Management process area for more information about selecting improvements.
Refer to the Work Monitoring and Control process area for more information about managing corrective action to closure.
New or changed standard services can require new or changed service systems. These service systems can support single or multiple customers and single or multiple standard services. Thus, needed actions can also include establishing and maintaining “core assets” (e.g., components, tools, architectures, operating procedures, service system representations, software) to more effectively and efficiently develop or customize service systems that deliver standard services to multiple customers.
4. Review and get agreement from relevant stakeholders on the standard services to be established and maintained.
SG 2 Establish Standard Services
A set of standard services is established and maintained.
SP 2.1 Establish Properties of Standard Services and Service Levels
Establish and maintain properties of the organization’s set of standard services and service levels.
Multiple standard services and service levels may be required to address the needs of different customers, units of the organization, markets, or application domains. In addition to establishing standard services, services can be grouped into service lines when the size and complexity of the set of services warrants further organization. The organization develops standard processes to deliver standard services.
Refer to the Organizational Process Definition process area for more information about establishing standard processes.
Example Work Products
1. Critical attributes of standard services
2. Organization’s set of standard service levels
3. Templates for service level agreements (SLAs)
4. Tailoring criteria
5. Common and variable parts of standard services
6. Grouping of services into service lines
7. Needs and expectations for service systems that deliver standard services
Subpractices
1. Select standard services.
The selected standard services should adhere to organizational policies, standards, and models.
2. Specify the critical attributes of each service.
3. Determine common and variable parts of standard services.
Variable parts of a standard service can be assigned categories and parameters. Standard service levels can represent some of the degrees of variability in standard services.
4. Organize services into service lines as needed.
This organization of services into service lines can include ensuring an appropriate integration among services.
Defined service levels make the levels of service that are offered specific and measurable. Service levels can help to balance cost and demand for services, and make roles and responsibilities between the service provider and user clear.
Determining service levels includes the following service requirements:
• The maximum acceptable continuous period of lost service
• The maximum acceptable period of degraded service
• Acceptable degraded service levels during the period of service recovery
• Redundancy requirements
Standard service levels can be reflected in standard SLAs or templates for SLAs.
6. Establish tailoring criteria as appropriate.
The organization uses knowledge of variability in customer needs to develop tailoring options that limit risk and improve customer satisfaction and time to market while maintaining consistency across the organization.
The tailoring criteria and guidelines describe the following:
• How the organization’s set of standard services are used to guide the development of individual services
• Mandatory requirements that must be satisfied by the defined services
• Options that can be exercised and criteria for selecting among the options
• Procedures that must be followed in performing and documenting tailoring
7. Identify needs and expectations for service systems that deliver standard services as appropriate.
In situations in which the organization will need to develop and maintain multiple service systems to deliver its standard services, it can be beneficial to establish core assets at the organizational level for developing and customizing such service systems.
SP 2.2 Establish Descriptions of Standard Services
Establish and maintain descriptions of the organization’s defined standard services.
Establishing the properties of standard services is not sufficient. These properties should also be packaged into specific descriptions. In addition to a set of descriptions used by the service provider, a separate version is typically needed for customer use. A common failure mode with the use of standard services is that they are defined and described to meet the needs of some staff in the service provider organization but not described in a manner that is effective and appropriate for all intended users of standard services. For successful use, standard services should be appropriately described for the full range of intended users of the descriptions.
Example Work Products
1. Descriptions of services
2. Service catalog or menu
3. Adjunct materials such as instructions for delivery staff, sales force instructions, proposal and pricing information, and contracting information
Subpractices
1. Develop the descriptions of standard services for all relevant users.
Additional materials related to the standard services can also be developed if they do not already exist. These materials can include information for those who develop specific services, service delivery staff, or sales and other business staff.
2. Conduct peer reviews on the descriptions with relevant stakeholders.
Customer and end-user representatives can be included in these peer reviews to ensure that the descriptions meet their information needs.
3. Revise the descriptions as necessary.
4. Store the descriptions in a location and medium where all intended users have access.
To be effective, standard service descriptions should be available and accessible in a consistent location that encourages use by the full range of intended users. The location can be a large, complex online repository or a single sheet of paper, depending on the characteristics of the services and organization.
While the catalog or menu of services is often in an electronic format, many organizations also produce a paper version. Adjunct materials can be stored along with the descriptions, such as the tailoring guidelines or instructions for the delivery staff, sales force, proposal authors, and contract specialists. Variants of the service catalog or menu may be required for customers and staff of the service provider organization.