ITIL Life Cycle – SERVICE OPERATION

Service Operation is where the value of the services being provided is first realized by the customer.  During Service Operation, the day-to-day operation of the processes that manage the services takes place.  It is also where performance metrics for the services are gathered and reported.

Service Operation is where these plans, designs, and optimizations are executed and measured.  From a customer viewpoint, Service Operation is where actual value is seen.

The Service Operation phase provides the environment for:

• The maintenance and stability of Service Operations while allowing for changes in design, scale, scope, and service levels
• Decision making in areas such as managing the availability of services, controlling demand, optimizing capacity utilization, scheduling operations, implementing changes, providing technical support to the users, and fixing problems. [i]

SERVICE OPERATION VALUE

Each stage in the ITIL Service Lifecycle builds value for the business and culminates in Service Operations.  For example:

• In Service Strategy, the service is modeled
• In Service Design and Service Transition, the service is designed and developed, and the cost is predicted and validated
• In Continual Service Improvement, the measures for optimization are identified