Overview of ITOps (IT Operations)

Every organization uses IT systems as per the way it meets its clients and employees  requirements. The ITOps as they call it Information Technology Operations is a distinct group within the IT department and it comprises a group of IT operators and is headed by IT operations manager. 

This team foresees and plays a critical role in achieving business goals and helps to maintain a sustainable IT ecosystem and ensures that IT empowers organization employees and management to achieve business desired outcomes with the aid of IT systems. 

Today in this article we will look at the concept of ITOps, why it is needed, its benefits and use cases etc. 

What is ITOps?

IT operations are important because they own the end to end responsibility of services provided by IT organization, systems and infrastructure which support an organization’s business processes. Operational stability of an organization is taken care by IT operations and parallelly they push initiatives so business moves onto next levels.

ITOps is a broader term and sometimes looks like it covers everything related to IT. ITOps activities may vary from organization to organization but the common objective is they have the responsibility to maintain the technology required to run businesses and not just about keeping the lights on. 

It may include tasks like 

  • maintaining networks, 
  • managing data centres,
  • ensuring security and regulatory compliance, 
  • management of help desk services, 
  • licensing and 
  • managing software’s & other tasks 

to empower teams and support daily business operations. Excluding program and application development and its related risks. 

Goals of ITOps 

ITOps is responsible for basic requirements. It’s generally responsible for 

  • delivery and maintenance of services, 
  • applications and technologies required to run a business.

ITOps has some core functionalities common throughout organizations and six tasks are identified within the Agile framework here.

6 Core Functional Tasks

I. Running Solutions

The primary purpose behind ITOps is running solutions which includes performing backups, configuring servers and restoration of systems after a crash or an outage. The objective is to optimize performance of the systems and allocation of proper resources as per need or order in which they would be most effective in-service delivery.

II. Manage Infrastructure

On premises or cloud oversight of infrastructure management is key responsibility of IP Operations. Infrastructure comprises computing, network devices, software applications and cloud resources – applications deployed over cloud , network security, facilities management and hybrid clouds is part of the IT operations domain of activities.

III. Manage Configurations

ITOps team is responsible for documentation of solution dependencies and hardware configurations and also implementation of new configurations to optimize performance of IT services 

IV. Evolve Infrastructure

IT services are constantly evolving and ITOps is responsible to identify ways to predict, prevent issues, identify impact, application of software patches and upgradation of hardware and software

V. Disaster Mitigation

Disaster recovery plans are owned by ITOps team – they plan, practise, and simulate disaster recovery scenarios in order to protect businesses and recover systems in the event of disaster.

VI. Govern IT Operations

Monitoring the performance of infrastructure, including the security posture of organization. Governance includes development of metrics to evaluate performance of services critical to business and processes, conducting infrastructure audits , management of software licenses and managing alerts.

Predict Issues & Prevent Impact

Apart from the above six key areas to look into, ITOps also help to protect and prevent IT operations from potential issues. Modern day ITOps which is advanced ITOps including predictive AIOps is able to collect data and turn it into meaningful insights for early identification of existing issues as well as early detection of potential issues which may occur in future.  

Best Practises: ITOps

  • Integration of IT solution – ITOps team required to be well versed with automation. IT automation approves visibility with monitoring and enables faster resolution.
  • Run hardware replacement cycles – Hardware replacement cycles to be run every few years to ensure everything is fresh. MSPs offer HaaS (Hardware as a service) for organizations to lease their hardware which is then updated by service provider as and when required
  • Implement communication and collaboration – The gap between IT departments and other department is important to bride as it impacts workplace productivity
  • Implement performance indicators – it is recommended to develop a list of performance indicators as per organization priorities for regular measurement to ensure alignment of IT to business
  • Evolve ITOps to manage cloud infrastructure – AI and its data driven decision making help ITOps to reinvent itself and adapt and empower themselves to support cloud environments.

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