RFCs need to go through a managed process to guide decision making and execution toward a successful outcome. A formal change management process is critical to implementing change in a fast, resource-efficient, low-risk manner.
The change management process will never be 100% right the first time around, but some process is better than no process. If the initial process is insufficient for managing changes, you will still see a high incidence of failed changes. Failed changes means extra work for IT, impact on business productivity, and lost revenue. If you look back at the end of your change management process and how well it performed, you can tweak it for the next time round. Over time, it will become more efficient and effective.
ITIL focuses heavily on the process side of change management, so it is wise to consult the ITIL V2 Service Support or ITIL V3 Service Transition volumes, but the typical process that ITIL recommends is as follows:
- Record - All changes to the infrastructure must be recorded by submitting a Request for Change (RFC).
- Review - The change manager acts as gatekeeper and will make a quick review of each RFC to decide whether it should proceed. Is it valid, specific, beneficial, feasible, and necessary? If so, the RFC will be accepted and classified. Otherwise, it might be rejected and returned to the requesting party.
- Assess - The change manager and the CAB (containing appropriate representatives from the business, user community, development, support, and any appropriate third parties) will assess the costs, resources, benefits, and risks (including impact on services) and will plan the execution of the change, including a back-out procedure.
- Authorize - Based on the recommendations from the CAB, the change manager will authorize the change or escalate it to a higher management echelon for authorization, depending on the type of change and potential impact. Once authorized, the change should be added to the Forward Schedule of Changes (FSC).
- Coordinate implementation - It is the responsibility of the change manager to coordinate execution of the change plan, including ensuring build, testing, and implementation actions in the right manner and at the right time as agreed and published in the FSC.
- Evaluate and close - If the change has been successful, the RFC will be closed and the Post Implementation Review (PIR) will commence to assess the benefits of the change and how well the change process supported the implementation. The PIR will answer questions such as did the change achieve the objective? Is everybody satisfied with the results? Were there any side effects? Did the implementation exceed planned costs, resource usage, or downtime? It is here that continual improvement of the change management process happens. Any lessons learned from the experience can be fed back into the process to make it more efficient and effective.
Thanks & Regards
Prasant kumar sahu
