Implement IT Change and Configuration

Management Before Developing a CMDB

Published: 3 January 2017 ID: G00318869

Analyst(s): Roger Williams, Kenneth Gonzalez

Infrastructure and operations leaders often struggle to determine when and

where to start a configuration management database initiative. Implementing
a change and configuration framework will increase the odds of success.

Key Challenges
■ Infrastructure and operations leaders often find that the steps required to deliver a successful
configuration management database are neither obvious nor standardized. This can cause high
failure rates for CMDB projects.
■ Establishing a change and configuration process framework before implementing a CMDB
project is a critical success factor that is often skipped by I&O leaders who fail in their CMDB
initiatives.
■ More than half of CMDB efforts become unmanageable, due to a lack of business alignment,
inappropriate scope or inadequate process rigor.
■ The cross-functional nature of CMDB projects and the varying levels of process maturity in IT
organizations cause conflicts of priority and approach that can cause delays in CMDB
implementation programs, due to differing stakeholder needs.

Recommendations
I&O leaders optimizing IT operations to drive business value should:

■ Choose high-quality configuration tools and data sources by identifying candidate resources,
selecting the most valuable sources and implementing basic controls.
■ Develop a roadmap for IT change and configuration management process improvements by
analyzing organizational goals, existing capabilities and process challenges.
■ Sequence improvement activities by assessing organizational maturity and by focusing on
efforts that most directly contribute to the vision and business value.
 Introduction
Infrastructure and operations (I&O) leaders focused on optimizing IT operations to drive business
1
value are increasingly looking for help when planning an IT service view configuration management
2
database (CMDB) implementation. Processes and tools can be implemented individually; however,
dependencies emerge as cross-organizational use expands. These dependencies span people,
process, technology and information enterprisewide, making IT service view CMDB
3
implementations challenging.

I&O leaders need to use a structured approach to optimize the timing of activities (see Figure 1).
They can execute some of the projects on the road to an IT service view CMDB simultaneously,
such as discovery tool implementations and process automation. Other projects require IT change
and configuration management activities as a prerequisite to ensure success. This includes the
CMDB tool itself (see "Achieve the Integrated I&O Vision by Focusing on Information Exchanges").

Figure 1. Approach to Sequencing IT Service View CMDB Project Activities

Source: Gartner (January 2017)

Analysis
Choose High-Quality Configuration Tools and Data Sources
When starting an IT service view CMDB project, choose high-quality configuration tools and data
sources, and then augment them with targeted tool investments. These tools and data sources
create a starting point for planning, as recommended by industry process improvement and project
management frameworks. Meet this objective using a structured approach (see Figure 2).

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 Figure 2. Essential Activities to Identify Configuration Tools and Data Sources

Source: Gartner (January 2017)

Identify Candidates
Begin by benchmarking your configuration tools across all IT domains. Identify the types of data
and information that are included, then assess the accuracy and integrity. Scrutinize older data
sources, because they often contain older terminology and stale data. Exclude data sources with
poor data quality until the system owner corrects accuracy and integrity issues. Ensure that
effective discovery and federation techniques (such as automated discovery and defined data
models) are in place to confirm that the data from all sources is valid.

Select Sources
Identify the data sources that the IT service view CMDB will reference. Start with a subset of the
infrastructure that supports one or two critical IT services or applications. Focus on configuration
data sources that gather and log information relative to those IT services or applications. Conduct
inspections or use other data sources to verify all included data. Implement additional tools and
data sources only when information gaps cannot be addressed by your current capabilities.

Implement Controls
Implement a formal process and use automation to ensure consistent and repeatable configuration
changes to production. Define metrics for accuracy and completeness of the data, including
thresholds for removing data sources from the IT service view CMDB. Schedule regular reviews of
performance indicators to identify and correct issues quickly.

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 Develop a Roadmap for IT Change and Configuration Management Process
Improvements
Business needs must shape I&O leader prioritization of process improvements to IT change and
configuration management activities. Gartner research indicates that fewer than 20% of CMDB
4
projects have metrics based on specific business objectives. This alignment will improve the
success rate of changes and ensure that the CMDB represents configuration item data from trusted
sources only.

Determine which of the foundational processes to improve first by their alignment with business
goals. Implement IT change management improvements first to strengthen governance over change
requests and risk. Lead with configuration management improvements to enhance attribute data
quality. Ultimately, both processes are required, and I&O leaders must ensure that they are tightly
integrated to derive value from their IT service view CMDB investments (see Table 1).

Table 1. Determining Where to Focus Process Improvement Efforts

IT Change Management IT Configuration Management

Goal Reduce procedural errors Reduce IT system variation from approved states

Objective Standardize change prioritization and assessment Increase accuracy of IT component information

Challenge Limited visibility to true risk and impact Differing standards by technology issues

Source: Gartner (January 2017)

Starting With IT Change Management Improvements

Improve change implementation without well-developed configuration management by
standardizing the prioritization and assessment of changes. Discuss high-risk changes during
change advisory board meetings (see "Top Six Strategies to Optimize Change Management").
Without automation, the process will be slow, and, without configuration information, your ability to
assess true risks and impacts will be limited.

Automate change management activities to accelerate the request for change (RFC) life cycle,
including impact analysis, risk assessment, authorization, scheduling and the completion of
postimplementation reviews (PIRs). ITSSM tools provide most IT change management capabilities
and integrate with incident and problem management, as well as the IT service view CMDB (see
"Magic Quadrant for IT Service Support Management Tools"). Newer ITSSM tools also provide
functionality such as workflow, RFC documentation, analysis, scheduling and reporting.

If you have solid configuration data, use fact-based evaluations to obtain better results, compared
with using individual knowledge (see "Speed and Complexity Are Driving the Need for Effective
Configuration Management"). For example, comparing a server build to an image from an official
repository ensures that vital patches and updates are included. Without IT change management,
configuration drift will be extremely likely. This is due to changes to the production infrastructure

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 that may not be reflected in the CMDB, or vice versa (see "Toolkit: IT Change Management Policy
Documentation Guidelines").

Starting With Configuration Management Improvements

Maintain accurate information about configuration items without a mature change management
process by implementing automation. Most IT service support management (ITSSM) tools provide
the discovery, consolidation and tracking required to keep a CMDB up to date (see "Critical
Capabilities for IT Service Support Management Tools"). Configuration tools can address several
critical elements:

■ How often configuration changes are made

■ What systems and applications are in place
■ Which time frames are the most active

Increase the consistency of configuration management across functions and technologies. Identify
technologies and functions that have low visibility, and install policies, tools and scripting that can
provide a configuration baseline. Implement an initiative to unify separate configuration activities
under a single process that can establish relationships among systems. This will accelerate some
functions that have not focused on configuration and help other functions work more uniformly. This
also applies to the actual data used to describe configuration items (see "Four Steps to Optimize
Configuration Management Process and Tools").

Supplement this information with effective change management to provide a more-complete view
via approvals, schedule checks and risk assessments. Document each step of the process and
identify the roles and responsibilities required to create and leverage efficiencies across IT domains.

Sequence Project Activities Based on Organizational Maturity

Conflicts of priority and approach often arise in CMDB projects, due to the cross-functional nature
of these projects. IT functional areas manage multiple technology types of varying maturities across
multiple process and data structures. Stakeholders in these areas have different pain points and will
disagree on what to fix first.

Establish a vision, maturity baseline and metrics prior to starting an IT service view CMDB project.
I&O leaders must define the vision for how the use of the CMDB will deliver business value. They
must then govern IT change and configuration management improvements to resolve cross-domain
process and architecture work efforts in service to this vision. This is particularly important for
configuration management before implementing a CMDB, due to the level of detail that can distract
stakeholders from business objectives.

Be patient with maturity improvement efforts. Gartner ITScore for I&O (ITSIO) research shows that it
takes considerable time (often more than a year in larger environments) to move from ad hoc
processes to a formalized framework (such as ITIL) for IT change and configuration management.
This includes staff training, process development and tool investments. (Consult "ITScore for I&O

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 Analysis: Take Action Now to Improve Your Organization's Maturity" for insight into improving
immature infrastructure and operations environments.)

Gartner Recommended Reading

Some documents may not be available as part of your current Gartner subscription.

"Three Rules to Renovate Your CMDB to Improve Business Outcomes"

"Speed and Complexity Are Driving the Need for Effective Configuration Management"

"Top Six Strategies to Optimize Change Management"

"Four Steps to Optimize Configuration Management Process and Tools"

"Seven Steps to Select Configuration Item Data and Develop a CMDB Project That Delivers
Business Value"

"ITScore for I&O Analysis: Take Action Now to Improve Your Organization's Maturity"

"Toolkit: A Workshop to Assess Our I&O Maturity With Gartner's ITScore"

"Achieve the Integrated I&O Vision by Focusing on Information Exchanges"

"How to Improve IT Processes to Deliver Momentous Business Impact"

"Well-Defined Duties of the Process Owner and Process Manager Are Critical Success Factors for
Service Improvement Programs"

Evidence
1 From2015 to 2016, there has been a 13% increase in Gartner client inquiries related to CMDBs,
change management and configuration management.

2 ITservice view CMDB tools maintain a near-real-time view of hierarchical relationships among their
configuration items. Four attributes define an IT service view CMDB: integration and federation,
reconciliation, IT service modeling and visualization, and synchronization.

3 Thisis the consensus of more than 30 Gartner client Peer Connect conversations with more than
170 comments and 9,000 views related to the topic of CMDBs. An example conversation can be
found here. All conversations were retrieved from Peer Connect on 16 December 2016.

4 Thisis based on more than 2,000 client CMDB inquiries that took place between August 2012 and
August 2014, in which fewer than 20% of all CMDB initiatives discussed with Gartner clients had
established metrics to determine the effectiveness of their CMDB data as it relates to project goals
(specific business benefits). A statistical evaluation of project success ratios for CMDBs with and
without these goals shows that CMDB projects with them are 130% more likely to be successful.

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