The University of the South Pacific

Background
The university currently has 65,000 students. More than 40% of these
students come from overseas. The expected revenue per student from
overseas students is about 40% higher than from local students.
The university has a central campus in Hong Kong (50,000 students).
Campuses also exist in Taiwan, Beijing and Sydney, Australia. Last year, a
pilot course was run in the business faculty in providing on-line teaching;
overall, it was a success.
Objectives
As a result of deregulation, the university has to depend more and more
on its revenues. These revenues are generated primarily through course
fees to students. Increasingly, the university provides services to
organisations in Asia and overseas, in terms of applied research. A good
example of this is the universitys involvement in cancer treatment.
The percentage of overseas students is estimated to increase over the
next 5 years to 60%. Another important statistic is that demography
statistics show a decline in the age category of 12-18 year olds over the
next 10 years.
The aim is to rapidly expand the opportunities in on-line teaching.
Particularly, overseas students are inclined to sign up for on-line courses;
the main reason is (cost) efficiency.
Challenges
The universitys main challenges lie in its Information Services (IS) area.
Historically, each faculty has its own IT department, which in turn is
spread out over various schools and research areas. The IT departments
vary in size, complexity and culture: a few are fairly customer focussed;
most are not.
IT investments are made de-centrally. No one has an overall control of IT
expenditure (totalling US$45M. last year)
The CIO has appointed an IT strategist, to look at the IT architecture and
come up with a central model for the entire university. This includes the
websites.
Specific comments that have been heard about IT provision:
Its a mess; everythings connected by band aids. Its a matter of
time before it falls apart.
Those people dont even know how to spell customer service.
IT is just a bottom-less pit; a lot of money is put in, nothing ever
comes out of it.
1. Reasons for IT Service Management

Objective: Positioning IT Service Management within an organisation
Format: Presentation
Input: Separate document Mini Case Study

Background: You, an IT Service Management consultant, have been
approached by Roger J olly, the CIO of a well-known university.
You have made notes of your initial discussion with Roger on
the universitys current situation (see separate Mini Case
Study document).
Assignment: Prepare a presentation for Roger on the need for IT Service
Management within the university. In this presentation, explain
what ITSM is and why it should be introduced to the university.
Time: 30 minutes preparation
10 minutes presentation (max) per group


2. Reasons for Availability & Capacity Management

Objective: Understand the reasons for a central Availability & Capacity
Management process
Format: Discussion / presentation
Input: Separate document Mini Case Study
Background: During a recent chat with Roger in the university coffee bar,
he tells you his concerns about the availability and
performance of the many IT services.

It turns out that each faculty has its own technical specialists
who maintain the individual systems. Therefore, the
performance of the systems within and between faculties
varies immensely. When you mention you might have a
solution, Roger is so delighted. He wants to know more.
Assignment: A week later, in the coffee bar, explain to Roger, in no more
than 10 minutes how he could approach the challenges he
described above.
Time: 30 minutes preparation
10 minutes discussion (max) per group

3. IT Service Continuity Management

Objective: Practice with risk analysis and management concept
Format: Presentation
Input: Separate document Mini Case Study
Background: The infamous hacker Gerardo hacked into the central system and
brought the central mainframe down for 2 days, as well as awarding
himself a Masters degree.

While Neal, who is responsible for security management, has promised to
instigate actions in his area, Roger is concerned about the lack of
countermeasures in case of a disaster. He appoints Dawn Craven, one of
the mainframe operators, as an interim Service Continuity Manager.
Assignment: You are asked, by Dawn, to head a brainstorming group on risk analysis
and management. Determine a number of potential threats, vulnerabilities
and countermeasures for the following assets:

Online teaching system
Central mainframe
Salary system

Present your findings to Dawn.

Time: 20 minutes preparation
10 minutes presentation (max) per group

Additional info:
The online teaching system is in the basement of the business faculty, which has its own
building on the local campus. As its still an experimental setting, the doors are left open, so
anyone who needs to work on the system can do so without too much trouble.

The central mainframe is in the main university building. Staff from all the universitys
campuses can access the mainframe through a WAN. The mainframe also has internet
connection through a firewall. Authorisation is managed by Dawns group.

The salary database runs on a midrange system in the main university building.
Authorisation to the database is very tight, for obvious reasons.
As no other applications are run from this system, it also serves as a test machine for a
number of application developers (they all follow clear guidelines).

4. Service Desk

Objective: Understand the various options for Service Desk organizations
Format: Presentation
Input: Separate document Mini Case Study
Background: There are currently 8 Help Desks for 12 faculties. Some faculties
share a help desk, a few have none at all. The variation of service
support is one of Rogers concerns. The perceived quality of
services is largely determined by the way questions and issues
are treated.
Assignment: Provide Roger with a number of options for improving the support
of IT users. Make sure you cover the following:

Service Desk organisations
Service Desk types
Service Desk staff skills

Time: 30 minutes preparation
15 minutes presentation (max) per group


5. Incident & Problem Management

Objective: Understanding the concept of incidents, problems and known
errors
Format: Discussion
Input: Separate document Mini Case Study
Background: Roger has opted for a central Service Desk for the entire
university.

As part of this major change, he has decided to introduce the
Incident & Problem Management processes.

Karen Frost, one of the most promising help desk analysts, has
been appointed Service Desk manager. Karen has sought your
help in explaining the concepts of these processes.
Assignment: Give Karen a number of examples of incidents, problems and
known errors that are related. Provide both IT and non-IT
examples.
Time: 5 minutes preparation
15 minutes discussion total


6. Configuration Management

Objective: Understand the added value of configuration management
Format: Presentations
Input: Separate document Mini Case Study
Background: Historically, the universitys different IT departments were
responsible for their own areas. As a result, information on the IT
infrastructure is scattered around the university.

Roger, the CIO, has a grand vision of one repository with all
relevant information of IT components. He asks J o, head of the
universitys library IT department, to act as a Configuration
Manager; she happily accepts, believing this to be a sensible
career move.
Assignment: One of the first activities of the project is to proclaim Rogers
grand vision. Help J o with the following:

Organisational benefits of one central information
repository
Challenges in setting this up
Ideas on how to get the other IT departments to co-operate

Time: 30 minutes preparation
15 minutes presentation (max) per group

7. Change Management

Objective: Understand the necessity of change management and the main
activities within this process
Format: Presentation
Input: Separate document Mini Case Study
Background: On a Monday morning, the e-learning system is hit by an outage.

Although the incident is detected and dealt with rapidly, a large
number of students were affected. Karen, the Service Desk
manager, insists on a proper investigation.

The Problem Management process reveals that Troy Black, one
of the technicians, did some maintenance on the system the day
before. As it was a Sunday, Troy didnt bother to inform anyone of
this.

Assignment: Roger asks you for some advice on how to avoid this in the future.
Present him with the following:

The essential activities that would need to be part of a
change management process

How to include all areas of this large infrastructure in this
process, without making it too bureaucratic?


Time: 30 minutes preparation
15 minutes presentation (max) per group



8. Consequences of Processes

Objective: Understanding the process concept
Format: Meeting
Input: Results exercise 1
Background: Roger is convinced that introducing ITSM processes into the
university is a good thing. However, he is well aware that this could
clash with the culture of the various IT departments that currently
operate independently.

Assignment: In a meeting with representatives of the various IT departments,
explain the following concepts:

ITSM processes (use a specific ITIL process as an example)
Service culture
Continuous improvement

Make sure that your input is specific and to the point (no abstract
discussions!)

Time: 30 minutes preparation
15 to 25 minutes meeting (max) per group

9. Summary

Objective: Summarise all ITIL processes
Format: Presentation / discussion
Input: Entire ITIL Essentials training
Background: You now possess an impressive amount of ITIL knowledge.
Congratulations!

To test whether you fully understand the concepts of the
processes, imagine running a hotel. You have rooms, a
restaurant, a bar, a gym and a few convention rooms to manage.

Assignment: Apply the ITIL concepts to managing the hotel. Your instructor will
assign a number of processes to the subgroups. After
preparation, your subgroup will present the results to the entire
class.
Time: 30 minutes preparation
15 minutes presentation (max) per group