The Capacity Management process (CM in a can 2/10)

I was talking about mergers and acquisitions and the important role that capacity management plays in this and it would seem relevant to take a step back first and look at what the goal of the Capacity Management process is.

The ITIL (v3) Capacity Management process as defined in the ITIL Service Design book states:

The Capacity Management process should ensure that cost-justifiable IT capacity in all areas of IT always exists and is matched to the current and future agreed needs of the business, in a timely manner.

The purpose of Capacity Management is to provide a point of focus and management for all capacity and performance-related issues, relating to both services and resources.

The objectives are to:

(1)  Produce and maintain the Capacity Plan

(2)  Provide advice and guidance to IT

(3)  Ensure that SLAs are met by managing performance and capacity

(4)  Assist with diagnosis of incidents and problems (related to capacity)

(5)  Assess impact of all changes on the Capacity Plan and on all services and resources

(6)  Ensure proactive measures to improve the performance of services are implemented wherever it is cost-justifiable to do so

Scope: All areas of technology (hardware and software), space planning, environmental planning and certain aspects of human resource planning

There are three levels of Capacity Management – Business, Service, and Component.

Business Capacity Management translates business needs into requirements for service and IT infrastructure.  These requirements include new services, new users, changes/improvements, and growth in the existing services.

Service Capacity Management deals with capacity requirements and performance of live, operational services.  The key is to ensure that capacity and performance are such that SLAs are met – and also that service levels are monitored and measured.

Component Capacity Management is the sub-process that deals with the management, control, and prediction of the performance, utilization, and capacity of individual IT technology components

Even in a compressed timescale, it’s crucial that a company consider all three levels of Capacity Management when implementing the process.

Join me again on Monday when I’ll be looking at what activities should be included in the Capacity Management process.

Rich Fronheiser

VP, Strategic Marketing