Lecture 3. Modern concepts of IT infrastructure management

Target: Studying the features of the application of the process approach and modern concepts of organizing the management of the IT department.

Duration: 2 hours

Plan:

Application of the process approach to improve IT infrastructure management:

Functional and process approaches to management;

Methodology for the implementation of the process approach.

Business - oriented IT management in the modern enterprise.

Service approach to IT management: IT Service Management.

Brief summary of the lecture

Currently, two main approaches to enterprise management are distinguished and opposed to each other: process management and functional management. . The method of management that considers the organization not as a set of departments, but as a set of business processes (BP) is called the process approach [Repin, Eliferer, 2004].

Understanding the shortcomings of the functional approach, experts came to the conclusion that one should pay attention to the processes taking place in the organization, since they go through all departments, involve all services, are focused on final result. Management begins to manage processes, build them the way they are needed for effective operation. Thus, the organization is presented as a set of processes, its management becomes the management of processes. At the same time, each process has its own goal, which is a criterion for its effectiveness - optimally this process leads to its achievement. The goals of all processes are the goals of the lower level, through the implementation of which the goals of the upper level are achieved - the goals of the organization. By managing processes and constantly improving them, the organization achieves high efficiency of its activities.

To apply the process-oriented management of an organization, it is necessary to understand: what kind of BP it has, how they proceed and how to evaluate their effectiveness. Therefore, the organization must formalize the processes, establish indicators of their effectiveness, and define the procedures for managing processes. Process efficiency (performance) indicators are quantitative and quality parameters process characterizing, as a rule, the relationship between the result achieved and the resources used.

The key steps in implementing a process approach to management are:

definition and description of existing business processes and the order of their interaction in the overall network of processes of the organization;

a clear distribution of the responsibility of managers for each segment of the entire network of business processes of the organization;

definition of performance indicators and methods for their measurement (for example, statistical);

development and approval of regulations formalizing the operation of the system;

management of resources and procedures when deviations, inconsistencies in the process or product, or changes in external environment(including changing customer requirements).

The process approach to the organization of work in the IT departments of enterprises of various types and sizes was described in sufficient detail and began to be applied relatively recently. An important step in this direction was the first publication in 1989 of the IT Infrastructure Library (ITIL); ITIL methodology has been widely used since the release of the second version in 1999.

The concept of IT Service Management - IT Service Management (IT Service Management, ITSM) [Pototsky, 2003] considers the provision and support of IT services designed in accordance with the needs of the organization.

ITSM is a strategy and approach to building and organizing the work of an IT service in order to most effectively solve a company's business problems. With this approach, the IT department should not just maintain the IT infrastructure, but act as a provider of IT services to the company's business units.

At the same time, both other departments of the organization and external organizations or individuals.

The main ideas of the ITSM approach are:

effective organization of the work of the IT service and its interaction with other business units based on the business architecture of the enterprise;

application of the process approach to IT infrastructure management;

positioning the IT department as a service provider of consistent quality. At the same time, the process organization of the provision of services and the availability of efficiency parameters specified in advance in the service level agreement allow IT departments to provide relevant services, measure and improve their quality;

in contrast to the traditional technology approach, ITSM recommends focusing on the customer and their needs, on the services provided to the IT user, and not on the technologies themselves.

Goals of the ITSM approach:

improving the quality of services provided while reducing the total cost of IT;

increase in the share of profits from IT;

turn the IT department from a costly unit into a valuable one strategic resource a company that is a full-fledged participant in the business;

make the work of the IT department controllable, transparent for reporting and measurable.

The essence of ITSM is the need to move from the traditional model, where the main objective- this is the actual support of the IT infrastructure, to a scheme focused on servicing the company's core business. The solution to this problem is complicated by the fact that this will require a rather radical revision of the overall positioning of service IT departments in the structure of companies.

The most important component of ITSM implementation is the development of formalized processes for the IT department. For each process, the sequence of work, the necessary resources and time, automation and quality control tools are determined. In addition, if a process is clearly defined and documented, including input parameters and execution results, its performance can be measured. This is especially important when the IT department is faced with the task of providing a service of a given quality for a certain cost. And this will allow you to improve the process and make the necessary changes in a proactive mode - even before there was a failure in the implementation of the service.

ITSM is not about details and details technical management processes, IT service management is aimed at ensuring the implementation of business processes and at structuring the internal organization of the work and activities of the IT department.

The implementation of ITSM also includes the formalization of work regulations for employees and IT departments, the definition of areas of responsibility and authority of personnel, criteria for the quality of work and the formation of mechanisms for controlling and monitoring the state of processes.

IT Service Management is an IT infrastructure management concept that is strategically focused on the provision of services and focused on the consumer of these services. The concept combines the advantages of a process approach in organizing work and the need for the correct construction of processes, thereby helping to find mutual understanding between IT managers and heads of company departments.

The concept of ITSM emerged as a result of a fundamental change in today's role of IT departments. Business processes are so closely linked to applications, technical resources, and the activities of automation staff that the effectiveness of the latter is one of the decisive factors in the effectiveness of the company as a whole.

The main advantage of the ITSM approach is that the IT department ceases to be an auxiliary element for the company's core business, responsible only for the operation of individual servers, networks and applications that are used "somewhere and somehow" in the company. The automation department becomes a full-fledged participant in the business, acting as a provider of certain services for business units, and the relationship between them is formalized as a “service provider - service consumer” relationship. The business unit formulates its requirements for the required range of services and their quality, the company's management determines the amount of funding to meet these requirements, and the automation units maintain and develop the company's information infrastructure in such a way that it is able to provide the requested service with a given quality.

A full transition to a service basis will allow the IT departments of any company not only to turn from a costly unit into a profit center, but also to offer their IT services outside own organization, thereby moving to the status of a department with an independent budget.

Thus, the introduction of ITSM will make it possible to information structure convenient and reliable business tool that allows you to maintain the desired quality information services, achieve competitive advantage core business and manage your profitability.

Literature:

Pototsky M.Yu.

Repin V.V., Eliferov V.G. Process approach to management. Modeling of business processes. Moscow: RIA "Standards and Quality", 2004.

Osinovsky A. S. Application of the process approach in improving the organizational and managerial structure of the IT service. St. Petersburg: "Azbuka", 2000.

Optimization of business processes. St. Petersburg: "Bmikro", 2002.

Robson M., Ullah F. Practical guide on business process reengineering. Moscow: Unity, 1997.

Rob England, Introduction to Real ITSM, 2008.

Test questions:

Lead comparative characteristics process and functional approaches.

Describe the methodology for implementing the process approach.

What is Business Oriented IT Management?

Explain the goals, essence and objectives of the ITSM concept.

What is the advantage of the ITSM concept?

Lecture 4. Information Technology Infrastructure Library (ITIL)

Target: Introduction to the Information Technology Infrastructure Library (ITIL) methodology. Studying the processes of providing and supporting IT services.

Duration: 2 hours

Plan:

ITIL is the basic concept of IT service management.

Provision of services (Service Delivery).

Service support (Service Support).

New versions of ITL.

Brief summary of the lecture

The Information Technology Infrastructure Library (ITIL) is an information technology infrastructure library created in the late 80s based on the best practices of leading software and hardware manufacturers.

The IT Infrastructure Library of Excellence was developed by the Central Communications and Telecom Agency (CCTA) at the direction of the British government for use by IT services. [Pototsky, 2003].

ITIL is a strictly regulated system of requirements and recommendations for organizing activities to manage the provision of information services (IT services or IT services) in accordance with a certain level of quality and costs. ITIL is not a product, not a program, not a system. ITIL is a methodology that will allow the user to ensure the effective functioning of Information Technology services, meeting the needs of business users, stable and predictable development of the information system.

The key concept in ITIL is IT service management (IT service). An IT service is a described set of IT and non-IT related facilities supported by an IT service provider that meets one or more customer needs, achieves the customer's main business objectives, and is perceived by the customer as a whole.

The main ideas of ITIL:

Information service is a business partner. The IT department should not be an auxiliary element for the main business of the company, responsible only for the operation of individual servers, networks and applications that are used somewhere and somehow in the company;

The main product of IS is an IT service. The IT department becomes a full participant in the business, acting as a provider of certain services (services) for business units, and the relationship between them is formalized as a service provider - service consumer relationship;

IT services are a described set of facilities, both IT and non-IT, that are supported by an IT service provider, satisfy one or more customer needs, achieve the customer's main business objectives, and are perceived by the customer as a whole;

Service management includes many procedures that allow you to quickly and efficiently formulate, change and control service levels defined for each user according to predetermined criteria and parameters of the system functioning;

Service quality is a set of characteristics of a product or service that shape the ability of a product to satisfy stated and implied needs.

Currently, there are already 3 versions of the ITIL library. Books included in ITIL versions 1 and 2, published in 2000 - 2004. [Pototsky, 2003]:

Service Support.

Provision of services (Service Delivery).

Security Management.

Information and Communication Technology Infrastructure Management (ICT Infrastructure Management).

Application Management.

Planning to Implement ITSM (Planning to Implement ITSM).

Business Perspective - in development.

The IT Infrastructure course focuses on two main books: Service Support and Service Delivery.

The Service Delivery block includes a set of business processes that ensure the development of high-quality, cost-effective services that meet business requirements:

Service level management (Service Level Management);

Management of opportunities (or capacities) (Capacity Management);

Continuity Management;

Cost management (or finance) (Cost Management);

Availability Management.

The Service Support block includes a set of business processes that ensure the stability and flexibility of existing services. The business processes of this group are focused on maintaining information systems and infrastructure components, resolving incidents and problems, and tracking changes:

Incident Management;

Problem Management;

Configuration Management;

Release Management;

Change Management.

The description of each process includes the goal, tasks, terms, activities, performance indicators.

Service Level Management– provides a process of harmonization of requirements for the service provided between the customer (business unit) and the contractor (IT unit).

The purpose of this process is to reach an agreement between the customer and the contractor. At the same time, it is necessary to find a balance between the requirements of business and the possibilities of information technology.

The agreement is drawn up in the form of a document - a Service Level Agreement (SLA), which specifies all the requirements of the business unit for the service provided in non-technical terms.

Capacity Management or in other words capacity management ensures the provision necessary resources to support existing services.

The goal of the process is to ensure that the required IT infrastructure capacity is delivered in a timely, forward-looking, and cost-effective manner.

Continuity Management provides preparation for emergencies, planning the behavior of employees of the IT department in case of problems and incidents, assesses the degree of vulnerability of existing information systems.

The purpose of the process is to ensure recovery technical means, as well as the entire infrastructure to support services in case of disaster, in accordance with the production (temporary s mi) plans.

Cost Management provides the ability to take into account financial factors in the support and development of services. The cost management process is necessary for budgeting the IT department and billing for IT services to the business unit.

The purpose of the process is to provide cost-effective management of IT assets that are used in the provision of IT services.

Availability Management the process of providing, developing, changing, optimizing, services to achieve an optimal, consistent level of availability. As part of this process, systems are designed to achieve the required recovery capability, and maintenance and security plans are developed.

The goal of the process is to optimize the capabilities of the infrastructure, services, and IT department to provide a cost-effective and consistent level of availability that will enable the business to achieve its goals.

Incident Management ensures the minimization of the negative impact of failures (disruptions in the operation of software and hardware) on the provision of services and ensures the fastest possible restoration of working capacity.

The goal of the process is to restore the normal operation of the IT service as quickly as possible and minimize the adverse impact of the outage on the work of users and departments of the enterprise, thus ensuring a consistent level of quality of service.

An incident is any event that is not part of the normal operation of a service and that leads to, or is likely to result in, the interruption or loss of the quality level of that service.

Problem Management ensures that the negative impact of incidents on existing IT services is minimized and the number of incidents is minimized by preventing possible causes. A problem is an incident or group of incidents that share a common unknown cause. The occurrence of a problem signals an unknown reason for the occurrence of several incidents and the possibility of their occurrence in the near future.

The purpose of the process is to help ensure the maximum stability of the services provided by identifying and eliminating errors in the infrastructure, identify the root cause of the problem and, as a result, prevent the occurrence of incidents.

Configuration Management provides a logical construction of an IT infrastructure model, which includes a description of existing configuration units (applications, servers, interfaces, etc.) and the relationships between them. The process also collects information about open and closed incidents, problems, known bugs, changes, releases.

The collected information is stored in the database of configuration items (CMDB, Configuration Management Data Base) and is used by various IT departments to plan work to optimize the IT infrastructure.

Release Management provides development, testing, distribution and implementation of new versions of software and hardware. The process optimizes the introduction of all changes or updates, reduces the risk of failures, allows you to correctly allocate existing resources in the enterprise and estimate the necessary time for making changes.

Change Management ensures that standard procedures and practices are used to minimize the likelihood of incidents occurring. Change management is considered the formal process of "accepting, recording, authorizing, planning, testing, implementing, and reviewing change requests (RfCs)".

The purpose of the process is to ensure that standardized methods and procedures are used to effectively and timely implement all infrastructure changes and prevent related incidents.

ITIL version 3 was published in 2008 . Unlike previous versions in the third version of ITIL, the focus is on the design of IT services, portfolio management of IT services. The interaction of the IT organization with the business occurs through the formation of a strategy for the provision of services in the organization.

ITIL version 3 declares the fundamental continuity of the spectrum of services. At one extreme are the services that a business provides using only its own resources (business processes, personnel, knowledge, etc.). On the other - IT services associated only with the use of IT resources (IT management processes, personnel, applications, etc.). These services are provided by the IT organization to the business. Between these extremes are services that use both resources. These services are planned and implemented jointly by the IT organization and the business, and are of primary interest in terms of ITIL version 3.

The interaction of an IT organization with a business takes place in the language of services, and service consumers can be not only people, but also business processes, other services, and even applications. The definition of the service is formed jointly, based on the requirements of the business (and ultimately its customers) and the capabilities of the IT organization (it is possible to involve third parties - outsourcers). What resources are needed for this and how they should be arranged is the business of the IT organization.

The connection of IT organization services with business strategy is provided through business processes: IT organization services are primarily implemented for those processes that are critical from the point of view of business strategy.

All decisions related to the modernization of information resources (processes, applications, personnel, etc.) are made only in connection with the services that the IT organization provides using these resources.

The list of IT organization services is agreed and approved by the business. It is the basis of all formal agreements and is revised only by mutual agreement.

Service Portfolio Management, according to ITIL version 3, is a dynamic method of managing investments in organization-wide service management in order to increase their value. A portfolio is not limited to a list of services, applications, tangible assets or projects. A portfolio is essentially a collection of investments that share common characteristics.

The Service Catalog is the only part of the Portfolio that is responsible for covering costs and generating revenue for the provider. Essentially, the service portfolio
represents the strategy of the service provider. Implementation of this strategy
involves making a number of decisions, in particular on the order and size of
investment. These decisions are made during the portfolio management process.

IT service design is part of a global process of business change.

Service Design covers five aspects of service design activities:

new or changed services;

service management systems and tools, especially the Service Portfolio;

technological architecture and control systems;

processes;

measurement methods and metrics.

Benefits of ITIL for customers:

IT service delivery is becoming more customer-focused;

Service quality agreements help improve relationships;

Services are described more precisely, better, in the language of the customer and with the required level of detail;

Transparent quality and cost of services;

Clear scheme of interaction with IT;

Higher IT quality – reliable support of business processes.

Benefits of ITIL for IT departments:

Clear structure of the IT department;

the IT department becomes more efficient, rational and focused on corporate goals;

More focused IT leadership, easier change management;

An effective process structure creates the basis for outsourcing IT services;

Following the best practices of ITIL contributes to a change in corporate culture towards the realization that the task of IT is to provide services;

Basis for IT quality improvement and implementation of ISO-9000 series standards.

The strategic advantage of ITIL for the organization as a whole - uh effective IT management across the organization.

Literature:

Oleinik A.I. Methodological foundations for managing the IT infrastructure of an enterprise "; In the book: Technique and technology in the XXI century: current state and development prospects: monograph / edited by S.S. Chernov. Novosibirsk: CRNS, 2009.

Pototsky M.Yu. IT Service Management, Introduction. Moscow: Open Systems, 2003.

Harrington D., Esseling K.S., Nimwegen H.W. Optimization of business processes. Publishing house ";Azbuka";, ";Bmicro";, St. Petersburg, 2002.

Robson M., Ullah F. A Practical Guide to Business Process Reengineering. Moscow: Audit, publishing house. Association "Unity", 1997.

IT Service Management. An introduction. itSMF-International. The Stationery Office, 2009.

service support. Office of Government Commerce. The Stationery Office, 2008.

john long, ITIL Version 3 at a Glance: Information Quick Reference, 2008.

Test questions:

1. SCHOOLECONOMY PROGRAM OF THE DISCIPLINE "Financial law of foreign ... financial law of the State University - Higherschoolseconomy under the Government of the Russian Federation Reviewers: Shepenko...

2. Higher School of Economics (40)

   Literature

   Russian Federation State University - HigherSchoolEconomy Faculty of Sociology Approved at the meeting... statistics. M.: Higherschool, 1998. Kalinina V.N., Pankin V.F. Mathematical statistics. M.: Higherschool, 1998. Kolemaev...

3. Higher School of Economics (141)

   Document

   State University Higherschooleconomy Faculty economy Department of Public Administration and economy public sector... Dobrynin, S.A. Dyatlov, S.A. Kurgan. // Economy education. International periodical scientific journal...

   economics protocol number ... programming in examples and problems. - M., " Higherschool", 1986 Bukaev G.I., Bublik N.D., Gorbatkov S.A., Sattarov...

Introduction

Currently, information technology is one of the main tools for creating competitive advantages. Information technologies allow organizing such processes as project management, operational management, risk management, sales management, financial management and other business processes at a qualitatively new level.

quality, timely and prompt execution The daily business functions of the Company's employees are largely determined by the reliability and functionality of the corporate systems used, while the operational activities depend on and are completely built on the capabilities of information systems.

The development of information systems, in turn, can only be carried out within the framework of appropriate infrastructure support. This concept includes the whole complex of interconnected systems, equipment and communication channels that unite stand-alone software and hardware systems into a single interaction environment. It is the capabilities of infrastructure support that determine the ability of applied information systems to process and transmit the required amount of information through communication channels, uniting all participants in information exchange into a single information technology space.

The uninterrupted operation and development of existing corporate information systems, as well as testing and implementation of new business applications in accordance with development plans, should be based on a reliable, modern, adaptive, flexible, functional IT infrastructure.

At the heart of the development of information systems of any organization, first of all, are the needs of the business. The requirements formed by the business are used in the analysis of the information systems market and the selection of the most appropriate solutions.

1. Strategic goals for the development of the Company's business

There is no single strategy for all companies, just as there is no single universal strategic management. Each company is unique in its own way, therefore, the strategy developed by each individual company is unique, since it depends on the position of the company in the market, the dynamics of its development, its potential, the behavior of competitors, the characteristics of its goods or services, the state of the economy, the cultural environment. and many more factors. And at the same time, there are some fundamental points that allow us to talk about the generalized principles of behavioral strategies and the implementation of strategic management. As a rule, the main strategic goal commercial organization is to ensure profitability and growth of business capitalization.

2. Goals of informatization strategy

The relationship between the strategic goals and objectives of the Company and the informatization strategy can be expressed as follows:

• The business strategy determines the directions for the development of the main area of ​​the Company's activity and the reasons for moving in this direction;
• The informatization strategy identifies those information technologies that are required to support and optimize the business strategy and shows how these technologies and systems can be implemented in the Company.

Thus, the informatization strategy is designed to determine a set of priority initiatives in the field of information technology, which will allow the consistent and coordinated development of the information technology complex of the Company, with the participation of all departments, based on uniform requirements to achieve the strategic goals of the Company.

3. Analysis and assessment of the current state of the Company's IT support

Goals and objectives of diagnosing the current state of IT support

The purpose of diagnostics is to determine the current state of IT provision for its further development in accordance with the developed IT strategy.

To carry out diagnostics, the following main tasks must be performed:
Diagnostics of IT support for basic, functional business processes and management tools;
Analysis of IT infrastructure;
Characteristics of ensuring information security;
Characteristics of the organizational support of information technology;
Typology and characteristics of IT support costs;

4. Formation of the concept of IT development

Basic principles of IT development

The development of information technologies of the Company should be based on the following principles:

• The development of information technology should be in line with strategic development Companies, and information technologies themselves, are a strategic component of the Company's business architecture;
• In the information technology architecture, both the structure of the Company's activities and the content of the key business processes of this activity should be fixed and supported;
• Satisfying priority business objectives: reducing costs, improving the Company's manageability, financial transparency, a single information space.
• IT investment protection: implementation of systems that are least exposed to the risk of business strategy uncertainty;
• End-to-End Solution: IT investments should go towards creating a “whole asset”.
• Balance between current and strategic tasks: the implementation of long-term IT projects should not lead to blocking the current work of functional units.

The real return on the automation of the Company can only be obtained through the optimization of management processes in the Company, the management of operational processes and the management of financial funds. Therefore, the development of the IT Company should go in four main directions:

• Consistent automation of all operational processes providing increased cost reduction and improvement key indicators the effectiveness of the company's business units;
• Development of a corporate information system based on an integrated solution and effective procedures for collecting, processing and providing information;
• Creation of an information technology infrastructure that satisfies modern requirements in terms of reliability and safety;
• Improving the efficiency of users and IT staff.

5. Approach to the implementation of the concept of IT development

IT Development Concept Implementation Projects

The scope and timing of projects implementation are determined based on the results of assessing the current state of the Company's IT support, a detailed analysis of the results and determining the direction of the Company's IT development. The project implementation program begins with the implementation of a set of works to prepare for implementation and detailed planning of work on individual tasks of automating business functions as part of the IT development strategy.

6. Organization of work on the implementation of the concept

Roles and functions of IT departments

IN organizational structure IT department has separate subdivisions responsible for IT development - this is the IT project management department.
The activity of this division is built on a project basis. The head of this department forms the required number of project teams (according to the number of projects in their direction), in which specialists of the relevant specialization are gathered. At the same time, project teams can be formed from specialists who are administratively subordinate to other heads of departments, depending on the specifics of each specific project.

Basic principles of management and control during the implementation of the concept

Management of the implementation process of the IT Strategy and control over the progress and results of each of the projects are built on the basis of the following principles:
Project goals should be set based on S.M.A.R.T.
The IT service should have a group of specialists - project quality auditors.
Every project should have a quality controller.
The Company must clearly define and approve the principles of project risk management.
The Company must approve uniform indicators for the control of project processes.
The motivation of project participants should be related to the result of the project.
Mandatory is the procedure for monitoring the project upon its completion.
A single frequency of control processes should be established.
After each project, internal “project lessons” (lessons learned) should be formed.

Conclusion

The primary task facing any IT manager is to ensure that the IT infrastructure and information systems of the enterprise meet the requirements of the business. The development of information technology requires significant investments, which is why it is of great importance for the head of the IT department qualitative analysis business needs to select information systems that meet these needs.

The IT infrastructure development concept defines the rules for building the company's IT infrastructure, the main architectural solutions and standards, the infrastructure management model and the requirements for management processes. The concept also defines the principles of transition from the existing state of the enterprise's IT infrastructure to the target one.

When developing the concept, an analysis of the current state of the Company's IT support is carried out, including an assessment of the existing IT infrastructure, the level of information security, and organizational support. After the analysis, various development options are evaluated, the direction of IT development in the Company is determined, the target IT architecture, requirements for infrastructure services are developed. Based on the data obtained, the level of compliance of the current state of IT with the target is determined and the stages of achieving the required level are formed, the choice of software and hardware solutions is made. Preparation and implementation of the selected solutions is carried out on a project basis.

Bibliography

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Copyright © 2010 Shlyaptsev A.O.

In the process of business activities, modern companies must solve a wide variety of tasks, including entering new markets, reducing the cost of products, the need to comply with regulatory documents, from accounting to the processing of personal data, and many, many others. Employees of the organization must be able to effectively interact not only with each other, but also with existing and prospective partners and customers, carefully calculate costs, maintain the competitiveness of the company and quickly process large amounts of information.

To ensure the fulfillment of all these tasks, it is necessary to build a high-quality IT infrastructure, which is a complex of interconnected systems, including software products, information security policies, network services and directory services, a system for backing up and storing information, monitoring and management, and others. The key tasks of the IT structure include ensuring the availability of the applications used for business users and supporting the development of the company.

Necessary components of a modern IT infrastructure:

• corporate email;
• videoconferencing;
• organization of joint work of employees;
• external resources of the company;
• Information Security;
• basic services;
• corporate data center;
• control and monitoring systems;
• data storage and backup;
• terminal solutions, thin clients;
• virtualization;
• data networks.

Building an IT infrastructure may include modern solutions in the field of:

• effective communication (including e-mail, video and voice communication, organizing remote access to shared resources, communication of remote units, management of individual communication components);
• system hardware and software complexes for data centers (virtualization of workplaces and servers, element management, cloud computing,);
• organization of workplaces (configuration and management of hardware and software and software, management of user computers);
• ensuring effective interaction between divisions of the company, managing internal work and services of contractors in the field of information technology (including the implementation and automation of ITSM);
• maintaining information security (analysis of possible risks, creation of protective mechanisms, effective information security management).

When building an IT infrastructure, the design and creation of its various subsystems is carried out, as well as the organization of the management of these subsystems and other work in the field of IT. To ensure the smooth operation of IT infrastructure components, it is necessary to remember about high-quality technical support, staff training and regular IT audits. The use of modern solutions in the organization of the IT structure of the company helps to ensure:

• obtaining access to information regardless of the physical location of the company's employees;
• setting access rights to the data of a particular user, depending on the security policy in force at the enterprise;
• providing access to common information space companies using both workstations and mobile devices, and terminal clients;
• continuous operation and use of hardware and software resources;
• reducing the cost of infrastructure operation;
• ensuring business continuity of the organization:
• the possibility of continuous development and increase in profits through the use of innovative technologies and efficient business automation.

As we have already said, IT infrastructure is a complex of interconnected information services and systems necessary for the functioning and development of information interaction tools in a company. Thus, this infrastructure is not only the foundation of existence modern organization, but also a strategic asset that is a kind of driving force for business. Therefore, the creation of a reliable IT structure that fully meets the needs of the company's business is a responsible and difficult task, which in most cases is almost impossible to solve with the help of an internal IT service. To create a truly reliable, scalable and high-performance IT infrastructure, you need a sufficient number of highly qualified IT specialists and experience in organizing an IT structure.

CIS - corporate information system - is its integral part, which includes databases, information centers, communication systems, sharing and work. When organizing a CIS, various important factors must be taken into account. For example, after the implementation of an ERP system, it turns out that the existing IT infrastructure is not suitable for servicing this system, and this happens quite often. The IT infrastructure is the basis for all systems and business applications, therefore, how it is built, how reliable and productive it is, depends on the operation of IT services, ERP systems, databases, and hence the success of the company's business activities as a whole.

• Development, coordination and approval of terms of reference - a document that contains the company's requirements for the future information system.
• Development of a working draft containing technical description procedures and activities carried out to implement the requirements specified in the terms of reference.
• Implementation - implementation of the created project.
• Formation of working documentation, which contains a thorough description of the created infrastructure, necessary for the operation and maintenance of the corporate information system.

Work carried out at the implementation stage:

• organization of engineering systems and SCS;
• formation of network infrastructure;
• installation of automatic telephone exchange;
• purchase of equipment and software;
• installation of server hardware;
• implementation of server virtualization systems;
• implementation of basic network services based on the TCP/IP protocol;
• implementation of Windows domain and Active Directory directory service;
• deployment of file servers;
• implementation of print servers;
• organization of database management systems (DBMS);
• implementation of servers for managing and protecting Internet traffic;
• creation of mail servers;
• implementation of unified communications;
• organization of terminal servers;
• implementation of backup servers;
• commissioning of anti-virus protection servers;
• installation of client workstations;
• installation of peripheral equipment.

Today in Russia there are practically no companies left that do not use information technology, and the problem of most of them now is not the lack of automation of certain processes as such, but the consequences of spontaneous automation carried out without long-term plans and without an idea of ​​the prospects for its development. . Spontaneous purchase computer science and software, ordering and implementation of business applications that are not subject to updating from small companies that no longer exist, the presence of different applications for solving the same task, implemented in different departments, the problems of administration and protection of heterogeneous segmented networks - this is far from complete a list of problems that heads of IT departments of various companies have to face today.

The IT environment of a company with such problems is quite difficult to manage, even though the capabilities of modern software administration tools are now much broader than the tools available to the IT department ten years ago. Tasks such as supporting different versions of operating systems and business applications, restricting access to resources and data as the number of users grows, managing server performance under growing load, timely installation of critical updates in large companies with heterogeneous networks and spontaneously formed IT infrastructure, cannot be call simple. According to consulting company Accenture, IT professionals spend up to 70% of their time on support existing system, including managing accounts and passwords in disparate information systems, solving user technical problems and manually installing updates. It is not surprising that they simply have no time to think about the development prospects and develop a strategic vision for the development of their unit.

It follows from this that many modern companies need not so much to automate their activities, but to automate the management of the company's IT environment. According to a Microsoft survey of 400 companies worldwide, more than half of day-to-day IT management activities are performed manually without the use of automation tools. As a result, over a five-year IT system operation cycle, more than 60% of the total cost of its ownership will be spent on the maintenance of full-time administrators.

Requirements for IT infrastructure management tools

Below we will look at exactly what requirements should be placed on IT infrastructure management tools.

Automate the installation of operating systems, applications and updates

In the presence of a huge computer park and a heterogeneous IT environment, it is much more profitable to install new operating systems and typical applications in automatic mode. The speed of mass deployment of basic software products is one of the tools to minimize disruptions in business processes and reduce the cost of maintaining the IT infrastructure.

Automatic execution of repetitive routine operations (for example, by recording scripts) greatly simplifies network administration. That's why modern facilities IT infrastructure management should allow for such actions.

In a rapidly evolving business environment, the business applications used to automate business processes are also rapidly changing. This raises the need to automate the process of regular installation of specialized software while optimizing the cost of it, which requires automated software distribution tools integrated with user account management tools.

A significant part of modern malware exploits vulnerabilities in the operating system, browsers, email clients, and business applications, and the vast majority of attacks on corporate networks become possible due to untimely installation of updates for these categories of applications. Under these conditions, installing critical updates to operating systems and business applications within a heterogeneous distributed network is a very difficult task that requires the involvement of a large amount of resources. Therefore, tools for automatic distribution of software updates (preferably with the ability to roll back) should also be present in the arsenal of the IT service.

Automated event processing and statistics collection

Automated event processing in the network involves tracking problems in managed computers and devices, automatically identifying and eliminating their causes, correcting the consequences of failures, and often preventing them by performing diagnostic operations and appropriate preventive measures, collecting and analyzing statistics on the intensity of use and the frequency of network errors. devices.

Inventory of software products throughout life cycle and checking them for compliance with the licensing policy is an important task - it allows companies, on the one hand, to avoid spending on unnecessary licenses, on the other hand, to eliminate legal risks in case of a discrepancy between the number of purchased licenses and actually used copies of products. Therefore, maintaining a detailed record of applications installed on the network, collecting statistics on their use in order to identify rarely used applications, and searching for outdated versions of installed software become relevant tasks in managing the IT infrastructure.

Performance and Availability Management

Performance management involves managing the configuration of computers and network devices, turning them on and off depending on a given schedule or in case of technical necessity (for example, turning on additional devices when a certain load level is reached). This category also includes control over the use of resources, in particular, control over the consumption of network resources by applications or users (for example, regulation of quotas for the use of memory, processor time, disk space), as well as control of access to network resources based on the selected security policy.

Application Management Architecture

The architecture of application management tools is approximately the same. Typically, such a tool contains a server part and a management console available to the network administrator. So-called agents are installed on all managed computers or other devices - applications or services that execute commands received from the server part, as well as collect information about the computer, applications running on it and events occurring with them.

Some application management tools can perform a variety of operations based on the data they collect, such as running tests, stopping or reconfiguring managed applications, and issuing diagnostic messages.

IT infrastructure management tools from leading manufacturers

According to IDC (see for example: Grieser T., Worldwide Distributed Performance and Availability Management Software 2005 - 2009 Forecast Summary and 2004 Vendor Shares. IDC MARKET ANALYSIS. July 2005. IDC #33752. Vol. 1), Hewlett-Packard, Computer Associates, and IBM are market leaders in application management tools in the automated event processing category (with NEC Corportion leading the market share growth), and Hewlett in the performance and availability management tools category. -Packard, BMC Software and IBM (Microsoft Corporation had the highest market share growth). Below we will focus on the families of IT infrastructure management tools of some of the listed companies.

BMC Software

BMC Software is a world-renowned developer and provider of network, application, database, ERP and CRM management tools that improve the availability, performance and recoverability of critical business applications and data. BMC products are available for a wide range of platforms, including various implementations and versions of UNIX, Windows, OS/2, OS/390, OpenVMS, and NetWare. Of the features characteristic of BMC products, first of all, it should be noted that they are focused on supporting user service level agreements (Service Level Agreement, SLA) and building a functioning model aimed at implementing such an agreement, as well as their high performance (Fig. 1). The company offers the following product families for IT infrastructure management:

• BMC Application Management- the tool is designed to manage the performance and availability of business applications (including applications from Oracle and SAP) and server products (such as Microsoft Exchange and J2EE servers BEA WebLogic, IBM WebSphere, etc.);
• BMC Database Management- a tool for administration, performance management and recovery of databases managed by DBMS leading manufacturers - Oracle, IBM, Microsoft, Sybase;
• BMC Infrastructure Management- a tool for managing server and mainframe operating systems, data storage, networks, hardware, middleware, and for optimizing the performance of these categories of software;
• BMC Operations Management- a tool for performing routine operations on a schedule and for reporting on events in the network;
• BMC Remedy Service Management- a tool for searching, detecting, modeling failures in applications and responding to them;
• BMC Security Management- a tool for managing user access rights to applications and corporate resources.

BMC application data can be stored in the Atrium CMDB (Configuration Management Database) BMC configuration database, which has convenient data visualization tools.

Note that BMC products include a documented application programming interface that allows you to create your own solutions based on them and integrate BMC tools with other applications.

Rice. 1. Areas of IT infrastructure management covered by BMC products

Computer Associates

Computer Associates' (CA's) Unicenter family of IT infrastructure management products can be customized to fit virtually any computing environment.

This family includes the following products:

• Unicenter Asset Management- a tool for automating the management of IT assets of an enterprise, with the help of which a comprehensive accounting and control of IT resources is carried out. Unicenter Asset Management functionality improves quality management decisions associated with the IT assets of the enterprise, and reduce the associated risks. Unicenter Asset Management provides monitoring of application usage on servers, personal computers and other client devices. In addition, this product allows you to automate IT asset management processes, including accounting and inventory of software and hardware operating in the enterprise network, maintenance of various components of the IT infrastructure, license administration and reporting in heterogeneous environments (Fig. 2);

Rice. 2. Areas of integrated IT infrastructure management covered by Computer Associates products

• Unicenter Software Delivery- provides automation of software deployment and update processes on desktop, mobile and handheld computers, as well as on servers in heterogeneous network environments, including application delivery, distribution of patches and updates, system configuration management and rollback of installations on various software and hardware platforms. This product creates conditions for increasing the efficiency of IT services and reducing the cost of information support for business by automating IT processes and implementing application catalogs with advanced self-service capabilities. One of the key advantages of Unicenter Software Delivery is a high degree of automation of software installation and maintenance processes and flexible and granular control of application delivery permissions;
• Unicenter Remote Control is a reliable and secure corporate system for remote control of Windows computers. The list of remote management tasks includes maintenance of remote services such as network applications, server administration, and remote control of end user computers (for example, when providing technical support). This system is one of the best industry solutions in its class and provides centralized system maintenance, policy-based management, access control, session auditing and advanced administration capabilities. Unicenter Remote Control is fully responsive large enterprises in terms of remote control and allows the operator to simultaneously perform several tasks at once: copy files to a remote computer, communicate with the user, launch applications, observe and record user actions, and manage settings and security settings. It should be noted that during the development of Unicenter Remote Control, special attention was paid to reducing the time of implementation and development of the system.

Hewlett Packard

HP OpenView is a set of software products focused on managing corporate information technology of any scale - from small systems based on Windows servers to large distributed systems based on various versions of UNIX, Linux and Windows, containing several thousand computers. This complex includes tools for managing networks, operating systems, applications, as well as their performance, copying and storing data, services.

The HP OpenView portfolio of software solutions consists of several product families (Figure 3), including server and application management, storage, networking, Internet technologies, and telecommunications equipment (there is a range of HP OpenView products designed specifically for telecommunications companies, and today HP is the most well-known supplier of telecommunications equipment controls). Separately, we note the presence in the portfolio of HP solutions of IT service management tools.

Rice. 3. Portfolio of software solutions HP OpenView for IT departments

The tools for managing servers and applications should be attributed primarily to HP OpenView Operations for Windows And HP OpenView Operations for Unix. These products are designed to monitor and manage application performance and control network and application events. HP OpenView Operations for Windows integrates with network infrastructure management tools HP OpenView Network Node Manager, which allows you to automatically search for new servers added to the network, and then automatically deploy the required components and policies based on the results of the service search.

To manage application performance, this family includes tools HP OpenView Performance Manager And Performance Agents, allowing using a single interface to centrally monitor, analyze and predict the use of resources in distributed and heterogeneous environments, as well as HP Open View Performance Insight, which helps to monitor events in the network and applications, analyze them. Solutions HP OpenVew Report Packs And HP Open View Reporter designed to create reports on the operation of a distributed IT infrastructure of an enterprise based on data received from HP OpenView applications.

To manage identity and access to IT resources, the HP OpenView family includes products HP OpenView Select Identity, HP OpenView Select Access, and HP OpenView Select Federation, and to manage backup and restore data of server DBMS - HP OpenView Storage Data Protector. The last of these products is an enterprise-level data protection and disaster recovery solution that implements instant recovery technology, as well as disaster recovery alternatives to eliminate unplanned downtime, which allows you to restore the health of an information system in a few minutes.

We also note the presence in this family of products designed to interact with end users in order to improve the quality of their service, - HP OpenView Service Desk, as well as business process monitoring tools HP OpenView Business Process Insight and management tools for service-oriented architecture - HP OpenView Service Oriented Architecture Manager.

To manage Internet services, this product family provides a solution HP OpenView Internet Services, which allows external probing of application services, Internet services and protocols by modeling user requests to directories, mail services, web services, remote access services (including dial-up and wireless access).

IBM

The IBM Tivoli family of products, designed to manage applications for enterprises of various sizes, is based on a set of basic components that build an enterprise-specific solution. The main distinguishing feature of this family of products is the so-called proactive management of the IT infrastructure, which is able to detect and eliminate faults even before they occur. The Tivoli family products are available for AIX, HP-UX, Sun Solaris, Windows, Novell NetWare, OS/2, AS/400, Linux, z/OS, OS/390 platforms. Note that in Lately IBM recommends implementing the Tivoli family of products to follow the ITIL (Information Technology Infrastructure Library) methodologies, shifting the focus in positioning its products from IT resource and systems management to IT service management (Figure 4).

Rice. 4. Some of the Tivoli software products that support the ITIL service management process

The Tivoli product family includes configuration management and operational support solutions for:

• IBM Tivoli Configuration Manager- allows you to manage the installation and updating of software, including on PDAs;
• IBM Tivoli License Manager-intended for software inventory;
• IBM Tivoli Remote Control- allows you to set policies to manage enterprise IT resources and remotely administer desktop systems;
• IBM Tivoli Workload Scheduler- allows you to automate workloads.

In addition to configuration management tools, the Tivoli product family includes performance and availability management solutions:

• IBM Tivoli Monitoring- to implement distributed monitoring of various systems, automatic detection and elimination of problems and trend analysis;
• IBM Tivoli Monitoring for Databases(DBMS manufactured by IBM, Oracle and Microsoft are supported) and Tivoli Manager for Sybase- for centralized management of servers and databases;
• IBM Tivoli Monitoring for Web Infrastructure- to manage web-servers and application servers;
• IBM Tivoli Monitoring for Applications- to manage SAP business applications;
• IBM Tivoli Analyzer for Lotus Domino 6.0 And IBM Tivoli Monitoring for Transaction Performance- to detect performance issues in systems based on IBM's own server products;
• IBM Tivoli Web Site Analyzer- to analyze visitor traffic, page traffic statistics, the integrity of the content of the website;
• IBM Tivoli Service Level Advisor- to provide predictive control and failure prediction through quantitative performance analysis;
• IBM Tivoli NetView- for network management;
• IBM Tivoli Switch Analyzer- to discover and populate all network layer switches;
• IBM Tivoli Enterprise Console- for multilevel troubleshooting and event analysis.

In addition, there are a number of solutions for automated control distribution of IT resources and peak loads.

The Tivoli family also includes security products:

• IBM Directory Server- to synchronize security data across all applications in use;
• IBM Directory Integrator- to integrate identification parameters contained in directories, databases, collaboration systems and business applications;
• IBM Tivoli Identity Manager And IBM Tivoli Access Manager for Operating Systems- to control access to applications and operating systems;
• IBM Tivoli Risk Manager- for centralized management of network protection.

In addition, the Tivoli family includes a wide range of backup and storage management products.

Microsoft

Although today Microsoft is not the market leader in IT infrastructure management tools, the company's application management tools are widely used in our country.

The main purpose of the Microsoft Microsoft Systems Management Server (SMS) and Microsoft Operations Manager (MOM) tools and administrative tools available to users latest versions Microsoft server operating systems (such as Automated Deployment Services, Remote Installation Services, Microsoft Group Policy Management Console, Microsoft Windows Update Services), - software management, automatic installation of Microsoft operating systems and applications designed for them, automatic delivery of updates, access control and user rights (Fig. 5).

Rice. 5. Management information systems using Microsoft Operations Manager and Microsoft Systems Management Server

Microsoft Systems Management Server is designed to ensure automatic distribution and accounting of software in large distributed systems based on the operating systems of Microsoft itself, including planning with the determination of hardware and software in the local network, verification, analysis, implementation of business applications for various target user groups, installation of applications on newly emerging jobs according to user rights. This product allows targeted installation of various software for different user groups, as well as solving problems related to software inventory and control over the use of software and hardware resources by collecting information about software products and equipment installed on the network and about their use.

Microsoft Operations Manager is designed to identify and troubleshoot network, hardware, and application problems by directly monitoring ongoing events, as well as the status and performance of network resources, and issuing alerts about potential problems (Fig. 6).

Rice. 6. Monitoring the status of servers using Microsoft Operations Manager

The product is designed to manage the IT infrastructure of small companies or specialized groups of servers (up to 10 pcs.). Microsoft Operations Manager 2005 Workgroup Edition. It allows you to identify potential hazards in the operation of software and, with built-in analysis tools, prevent them from escalating into serious problems, improve the efficiency of IT operations, simplify support for heterogeneous platforms and applications, and create your own service packs.

In addition, there are separate performance management and event analysis solutions for IT infrastructure components based on Microsoft server products, such as Active Directory Management Pack- to monitor the status of the Active Directory directory service, Exchange Management Pack- to manage messaging services and Exchange data stores, as well as a number of other products. To ensure interoperability with third-party IT infrastructure management tools, a product is available MOM Connector Framework, which allows bidirectional broadcasting of alerts and data synchronization using web services.

Instead of a conclusion

The introduction of such funds is a rather expensive investment. However, with a balanced approach to deciding which products to implement and which processes to automate, such a solution can be cost-effective, as it will free up IT specialists who are busy maintaining multiple servers and workstations and routine operations such as installing the same type of updates, as well as reduce costs associated with equipment and application downtime.

IT infrastructure and process management - ITSM (IT Service Management) is a modern approach to managing and organizing the provision of IT services, focused on meeting the needs of a company's business activities. Solutions created in accordance with the recommendations of ITIL v2 and v3, including the latest update of ITIL 2011 Edition - a collection of proven international practices for organizing IT processes, help to cope with all the complexities in managing the information infrastructure of an enterprise and its personnel involved in the provision and support of services. The success of enterprise IT infrastructure management is largely determined by the experience of an internal unit or an outsourcing company in this area.

Initial decision managerial tasks involves identifying the results expected from the work of information services, an objective assessment of the state of the IT management system and subsequent planning of measures aimed at its optimization. In each specific case, an individual concept for the development of an IT infrastructure management system should be developed. The main tasks facing the head of the IT department are prompt response to requests from employees of the enterprise and the rapid elimination of emerging failures. To solve them, it is necessary to organize a high-quality user support service and customer support service.

Support Service Requirements:

• automatic registration of incoming applications;
• a well-established and strictly regulated support process;
• availability of a process control and optimization system;
• the ability to assess user satisfaction;
• training of personnel to work with the automated system.

One more key task control over the changes taking place in the infrastructure. For this purpose, solutions are used for the inventory of software and hardware and automated receipt of data about the IT infrastructure in order to take into account changes in the composition and settings of its components.

Advantages of these solutions:

• creation of an automatically updated unified database of assets;
• regulation of changes to the infrastructure;
• fast troubleshooting;
• preparation of reports in an automated mode.

Specialized solutions offered by outsourcing companies help them competently organize the processes of planning, as well as the deployment and provision of IT services, which allows them to achieve the required level of service quality. Systems for monitoring the quality of services and IT infrastructure components provide reliable control. Effective management of the IT infrastructure of an enterprise is impossible without constant monitoring, which allows you to receive up-to-date information required to make the right decisions to improve the quality of services provided.

As a result of using modern solutions in planning, deploying and providing IT services, the following occurs:

• formation of the structure of the catalog of services and templates for the description of IT services;
• their introduction financial planning;
• fixing the required level of service provision based on SLA;
• introduction of monitoring of key indicators of services in accordance with the Service Level Agreement.

Recently, solutions aimed at automating IT infrastructure management processes using software and hardware systems created by leading manufacturers, including BMC Remedy, HP Service Manager, Axios Assyst, have become widespread.

Certification according to the international standard ISO/IEC 20000, which testifies to the quality of IT services and serves as an important indicator of the effectiveness of information processes in relation to the company's customers, is also a guarantee of the reliable functioning of its IT infrastructure.

Special tools for monitoring and managing the IT infrastructure help plan its necessary modernization and development, significantly reduce the number of time-consuming routine manual operations for setting up user workstations, reduce maintenance and support costs, while at the same time increasing the reliability and quality of information services. For every enterprise software solution should be selected individually, only after the IT structure and related business processes have been studied in detail.

Experts believe that Microsoft System Center will be the most justified choice for a Microsoft-centric infrastructure. The components of this solution are required for:

• secure, scalable OS and application deployment;
• end-to-end service management;
• storage system management, backup and recovery in a Windows environment;
• server asset, configuration, desktop and mobile device management;
• protecting applications and data.

In large companies where the IT infrastructure is organized on the basis of equipment and software from different manufacturers, specialized software from the largest international vendors is used, including IBM Tivoli, HP Service Manager, MS Service Manager, BMC Remedy, which supports most operating systems, hardware platforms, databases and business applications (IBM, Microsoft, Oracle, etc.).

Solutions include systems:

• managing software and hardware configurations, installing and updating applications;
• managing the degree of availability of business services;
• monitoring and control of engineering equipment, server and peripheral equipment, programs on computers and servers;
• control of installed software licenses;
• backup and recovery of information;
• data storage and protection system management;
• Service Desk automation.

ITSM systems developed by domestic companies have now proven to be highly effective solutions, and they continue to be constantly improved and developed. Their use allows Russian enterprises improve the quality of functioning of internal IT services.

Effective IT infrastructure management systems are based on the ITIL library, which contains the best practices for organizing the work of an IT infrastructure and combines a repository of information about it and the tools necessary to serve user requests. Electronic infrastructure documentation (CMS) provides specialists with the ability to quickly receive the required information in the process of processing applications. The HelpDesk module is essential for responding to user requests and quality service management. IT management should always use systems approach, which is the key to its effectiveness. ITSM solutions help enterprises improve IT infrastructure management, control the quality of IT services and reduce their costs.