Recommended business process for a new software purchase or yearly renewal

[rconner7]

Currently on the Istanbul release

What is the recommended or intended workflow of an out of the box setup of ServiceNow. We are looking to adjust/create business processes that would utilize the Contract Management, Software Asset, Release (we are looking to possibly utilize Release Management as a place to track the deployments/installation of these renewals) and Change Management . The scenario we are thinking about is how we setup the process within ServiceNow for a newly purchased software or a software renewal that we pay for yearly.

Is there an intended process to input the Contract, have it flow into Software Model(?), have something to relate to in Release Management and then to Change. It seems like there is so much in these different areas that we do not know where to start.

So we just received a completed invoice for XYZ software. Where is the first place you enter data so that it is tracked most efficiently into the other modules?

Thank you in advance.

[Community Alums]

Hi Russell,

You will find some differences between data center/infrastructure software and end user software when it comes to the management here. I am going to assume you are focused here on data center software as you are talking about release and change management. There are a number of different aspects to consider.

From the Asset side, you've got a couple things to track:

• The Software License - this tracks the number of rights you purchased, when you purchased, and other details about the purchase, such as cost, vendor, PO, etc.
• The Software License Contract - the contract record is used to track the terms of the purchases and any overarching agreement you have with the publisher of the software or vendor from whom you purchased the rights to use the software. In the case of subscription software, you can use this to indicate when the subscribed rights are active for the software.
• Software License record to Software License Contract - associate the Software License records (purchases) to the contract record to associate the terms with the purchase. With the purchases associated to the contract on a subscription contract, you can also identify the subscription period per purchase.
• Software Counter - associate the contract to the Software Counter and when the count runs, it takes into account whether or not the rights are active based on the subscription periods identified.

Release management can be used to track the overall release of the software in the environment. It becomes more of a lifecycle management step here, and I would associate this more with the management of your Software Models. For example, if you have Windows Server 2012 in the environment and you want to plan the release of Windows Server 2016 into the environment, you can track this overall process with Release.

Change would be specific to the installation of software to devices in the environment. When you update the software on a server (not for end user devices), you want it to go through the change process so you go through the appropriate risk analysis and understand what and who is going to be affected by the update. Release Management can feed into this so you step into the change with a better understanding of what is going to change when the change is applied.

Hope this helps get you thinking about this.

Ben

[rconner7]

Thanks Ben. The software will be mostly end user software. Office, Adobe, industry specific software(s), etc. Does that change the flow?

For Release, would we tie just the CI or is there a location to reference Software Model or Software License? - We would want the deployment team to be able to reference the license code for when they build deployment packages.

[rconner7]

Ben -

From your response is seems like you are saying that we need to create the software license (software asset > software license > new)   first, then create the contract (Contract > Contracts > Software Licenses > New), and tie both together. Now that i have the New license asset screen in front of me, it is requiring me to input a Software Model.

Does this indicate that we must create the initial Software Model prior to creating the new license asset?

[Community Alums]

Sorry, Russell. Yes. You need the Software Model first before you can create the Software License. I should have stated that as the first thing you need.

I've been working with our SAM Professional a lot lately and that will create the Software Model for you automatically when you have the Publisher Part Number for the Software License/Entitlement.

Ben