Change Manager

Valuemation Change Manager supports changes to IT infrastructure. Changes are planned, approved, checked and reviewed on the basis of standardized, ITIL®-compliant processes. This way service quality and availability are kept at a consistently high level, with minimized outages and risks.
Valuemation Change Manager registers all problems and requests received from customers. These are referred to as Tickets. Change Manager specifically deals with tickets of the Change Ticket Class. Change tickets are assigned to the person or group who should deal with them, prioritized and their handling is documented. For monitoring and reporting purposes it is also possible to set and monitor deadlines and progress.
Three types of Change are considered: Normal, Standard and Emergency Change.

Activity

An Activity is a task that must be carried out as part of the solution to the Ticket. Using Activities, part of the work on a certain Ticket can be loaded on the other people. On this account, Activities can be given its own deadline and responsible person, independent of the Ticket itself.

Calendar

This is the name for the calendar definition. In this catalog, the particular Working days and Holidays for various working groups can be defined.

Category

The Category is a tool of classification of a Ticket at a lower level. It is applied when an input from a customer is being processed (i.e. the Ticket is being created).

The categorization by Category can be useful for reporting or for an appropriate selection of a particular Support group, which will cater for the Ticket solution for instance.

Day Type

Using the Day Types, various working hours can be defined. This definition can be understood as a work shift.

Duration

The Duration is an estimate of how quickly the Ticket should be solved. It can be set dependent on Priority or Impact. Duration catalogue is not used in the latest Valuemation verson, it is replaced by Ticket Service Parameters.

Escalation (Escalation Process)

Valuemation Escalation is a flexible mechanism for identification of problems such as delays, non-fulfillment of business contracts or service level agreements etc. It recognizes the situation and can draw attention to it by setting escalation levels and carrying out actions (e.g. sending an email or creating a Ticket).

The Valuemation Escalation involves a number of steps which reflect an increasing level of urgency or an approaching (or overdue) deadline. The Escalation is started for a particular Escalation Parameter which indicates a collection of Escalation Types. For each Escalation level within that Escalation Type, the relevant objects are identified. The relevant Escalation Actions are then carried out for these business objects.

There are two kinds of escalation:

• Condition Escalation

  A condition is evaluated when the escalation is started. For each Business Object which meets this condition, the relevant escalation actions are carried out.

• Escalation Record Escalation

  A condition is evaluated when a business object (e.g. a Ticket) is created or updated. If the condition is met, then an Escalation Record is created for this ticket. This Escalation Record contains the Escalation Level and the date and time of the next scheduled Escalation. When the Escalation is started, all Escalation Records which have reached their time and date are escalated. The specified actions are carried out. The date and time of the next due Escalation is also calculated and recorded in the Escalation Record.

Impact

The Impact/Urgency of a Ticket describes the urgency of a Ticket. The more users are affected by a Ticket, the more likely it is to have a high Impact. Assigning an Impact to a Ticket will be a result of applying Business Rules. This will reflect who is affected, how badly, whether there is a workaround, etc. Impact is used to classify the Ticket and will often be used in Searching, Grouping and Sorting functions. It will also feature strongly in reports which may be generated about the Tickets.

Keyword

It is possible to define a list of special key words which can be used for extra Ticket classification. These key words are usually grouped in an appropriate class.

Keyword Class

Both the Keyword Class and its keyword may be used for a detailed Ticket classification when creating a new Ticket. Keywords usually have superordinated classes.

Model Ticket

Model Tickets act as templates for certain standard Tickets that occur regularly. The Model Tickets contain a framework of information, which is used to reduce the amount of work involved when a Ticket is reported. The pre-filled information in the Model Ticket can be used in the Ticket, or adjusted as required.

Priority

The Priority expresses how the importance of a solution so that the users responsible for a Ticket can organize their work. Assigning a Priority to a Ticket will be the result of Business Rules. Users will postpone working on a low Priority Ticket if a higher Priority Ticket is assigned to them. The Priority is used to classify the Ticket and will often be used in Searching, Grouping and Sorting functions. It will also feature strongly in reports which may be generated about Tickets.

Public Holiday

Public Holiday catalog lists the Public Holidays ("exceptions") for a given year. Through various Day Types, you can specify particular working hours for the holidays.

Reference Type

Reference Type allows you to specify which Business Object Types may be referenced in Ticket descriptions.

Statement Type

The Statement Type is used to describe and categorize the contents of the Ticket Description or Activity. This can be used to differentiate between the initial report from the user and steps towards analysis by a specialist, the actual problem, the solution and so on. It can also be used to indicate an activity (Installation, Systemcheck, etc.).

The Statement Type can be used to keep the Shorttext in the Ticket Description simple. For instance the Shorttext "Logon Failed" can be a report, a symptom, a query or the statement of the cause of the problem. By using the appropriate Statement Type, the natural language can be kept to a minimum, thus speeding up the documentation process.

Typical values could be Symptom, Check, Solution, Analysis, Verify etc.

Status Track

Status Tracking mechanism is used for tracking changes (status history) in a Ticket. It is in place to improve the quality and accuracy of the information stored about the Ticket.

Support Group

The support Groups are organizational units within an enterprise who may be involved in resolving Tickets. Typically the Support Groups reflect an area of expertise.

Ticket (Ticket Class: Incident, Service Request)

A Ticket is the central item in Valuemation IPC Management. A Ticket is used to represent Incident / Problem / Change requests.

Tickets (and Ticket descriptions) are the central Object Types in Valuemation IPC. All the classification and descriptive Business Objects are used to describe and classify the Ticket. By using existing values, typing time is kept to a minimum, which speeds up the processing of a Ticket.

A Ticket contains the information that is relevant to the IPC request. It also contains references to other relevant objects. The Ticket itself will contain information about the time it was reported, the impact and priority, the type of ticket etc. The Ticket will also contain links to the persons involved in solving the Ticket, the system affected etc.

A Ticket contains one or more Ticket Descriptions which are the individual steps required to access / identify and solve the issue. The Ticket Descriptions contain the historical sequence describing the Ticket and its solution. Where a specific task must be carried out, a ticket description can be replaced by an Activity. An Activity may be assigned to a person or group and can have a deadline and a duration of its own (independent of the ticket itself). Depending on the complexity of the Ticket, a Ticket may have more than one Activity.

Ticket Class

Ticket Class is the highest and essential level of a Ticket classification (there are actually four levels of classification for a Ticket itself). The Ticket Class is chosen through the workflow which created it.

Ticket Description

A Ticket consists of one or more Ticket Descriptions. Each Ticket Description describes a step in the process of identifying the problem and solving it. The Ticket Descriptions document status changes and steps taken to solve the problem.

Ticket Service Parameter Type

The Service Parameter Type classifies the Service Parameters. Usually there are Ticket Service Parameters of two types available:

• OLA (Operating Level Agreement)

  OLA defines the interdependent relationships among the internal support groups working to support a Service Level Agreement. The agreement describes the responsibilities of each internal support group toward other support groups, including the process and timeframe for delivery of their services. The objective of the OLA is to present a clear, concise and measurable description of the service provider's internal support relationships.

• SLA (Service Level Agreement)

  SLA is that part of a service contract where the level of service is formally defined. See also Ticket Service Parameter. SLA is generally business oriented and doesn't go into much technical detail. In Valuemation, SLAs are used for categorization and prioritization of a Ticket then.

Ticket Shorttext

Ticket Shorttext is a short description of a problem which has come about.

Ticket Type

Ticket Type is a more detailed ticket classification. It is a higher level of classification than the Category but lower level than the Ticket Class. The Ticket Type is dependent on a Ticket Class selected.

The Ticket Class and Type in particular will often be used in Searching, Grouping and Sorting functions. Both Ticket Class and Type will also feature strongly in reports which may be generated about Tickets.

Working Day

Public Holiday catalog lists the Public Holidays ("exceptions") for a given year. Through various Day Types, you can specify particular working hours for the holidays.