It would be fair to say that ITSM Certifications has evolved over the years. ITSM is not just structured processes and supporting procedures, it has evolved into an entity where discipline has become adept at putting processes in place to address inquiries with speed, efficiency, and accountability. Moreover, in the last decade or so, there has been widespread adoption of the Information Technology Infrastructure Library (ITIL), which acts as the guiding principle for all the processes in ITSM.
ITIL, which acts as a best practice guidance has a lot of abbreviations at each juncture. For first-timers who have not been part of the ITSM environment, it can be very confusing.
Moreover, people who work in such environments are comfortable with ITIL abbreviations and use them at regular intervals irrespective of whether the customer or the team is aware of such terminologies.
Here is your guide to gaining an understanding of crucial ITIL abbreviations.
1. Key Performance Indicator (KPI):
Key performance indicators – these include regular assessment of IT processes concerning performance and quality. In fact, KPIs vary among different organizations, IT infrastructures, and industries. There are also KPIs to measure design concepts, operations, strategies, and more.
2. Business Relationship Management (BRM):
BRM is a new concept in ITIL. As we said earlier, ITSM and ITIL have evolved over the years and BRM has been included in the latest ITIL version. BRM acts as an important entity in today’s IT operations. In fact, it acts as the management of relations to both business and IT departments. Industry experts believe, only when IT services are in line with organizational business strategy can they both operate at optimal levels as a single entity.
3. Operational Level Agreement (OLA):
OLA is similar to that of SLA, but to the company internally. OLA – is when a specific department in the company has agreed to provide specific services and products, whereas Service Level Agreement (SLA) – is when a third-party vendor has agreed to provide specific services or products. Hence, when there is an agreement between the IT department and any of the teams internally, then it is known as an OLA instead of an SLA. In addition, an SLA is what when you purchase software licenses and opt for cloud/data center services from a third-party source.
4. Capacity Management Information System (CMIS):
Capacity Management is at the forefront while drafting organizational IT policies, where they plan for the future IT capacity and infrastructure needs of the organization. CMIS can include many things such as hardware needs, software needs, database requirements, and bandwidth. Therefore, CMIS is a system that helps IT to manage, predict, and track the capacity needs of an enterprise that heads into the future.
5. Change Advisory Board (CAB):
CAB is a very important entity in the context of IT Service Management. Usually, the change advisory board consists of representatives from a few important areas within the organization such as IT, businesses, and a third party such as suppliers. All these key members advise the Change Manager to assess, prioritize, and schedule changes accordingly.
6. Value of Investment (VOI):
VOI refers to what is the value that the organization gets from any kind of investment made. If there is a clear understanding of the value derived from the beginning, then there is no chance of wasting money on irrelevant activities. For instance, what was the value derived from the investment made in a software package or a project management tool? The IT department should be able to justify the expenses incurred by exhibiting a VOI for new systems, software licenses, hardware, personnel, and more.
7. Service Asset and Configuration Management (SACM):
SACM is a process that helps to maintain all information that is associated with Configuration Items, which are necessary to deliver a particular IT service. It includes all the relationships among those configuration items. However, SACM is not even remotely similar to other asset management operations such as managing software licenses, tracking the lifecycle of hardware, etc.
If you are new to ITIL and everything in your IT department seems confusing without ITIL knowledge, then you can become more familiar with all the ITIL abbreviations by taking up ITIL 4 Foundation Course from a reputed training organization. Improve your understating of ITIL concepts, and gain familiarity with the ITIL framework.
