Benefits of ISO/IEC 20000 Certification to an Organization

Middle East Financial Institution Case Study
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Table of Contents
Executive Summary...................................................................................................................2
Introduction................................................................................................................................3
Section 1: Steps followed in the ISO/IEC 20000 Certification..................................................4
Planning..................................................................................................................................4
Assessment.............................................................................................................................6
Implementation.......................................................................................................................7
Section 2: Benefits of ISO/IEC 20000 certification to an organization.....................................8
Process....................................................................................................................................8
Service....................................................................................................................................9
Overall business....................................................................................................................10
Conclusion................................................................................................................................10
References................................................................................................................................13
Appendix 1: Essay....................................................................................................................14
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Executive Summary
Organizations invested a considerable amount of funds to attain ISO/IEC 20000
service management system standard certification due to various benefits derived such
accreditation. Firms that are certified have standardized processes and procedures; their
services are aligned to the international best practices thus satisfying their customers,
employees are happy to work in an organized environment while the management is able to
track performance. However, the process of attaining and retaining the certification is long
and requires commitment, but the benefits that accrued at the end of the process are
worthwhile.
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Introduction
ISO/IEC 20000 is a global standard or an international IT service management
(ITSM) that provides various requirements that must be met by an interested firm. ISO/IEC
20000 standard supports the company’s ITSM processes, whether outsourced or in-house. It
helps the company to be aligned with international best practice and the needs of the
business. ISO/IEC 20000 includes being formally audited to establish whether the IT
organization (ITO) is operating its service delivery proficiently (Iden & Eikebrokk, 2014a).
The ISO 20000 allows organizations to benchmark on the delivery of managed services,
assess their performance, and measure service levels. The ISO/IEC 20000 draws strongly on
and is widely aligned with the Information Technology Infrastructure Library (ITIL) (Greiner
& White, 2019). However, the only differences between the two standards are that the later
assessment focuses on best practice framework and has no minimum number of processes to
be performed. On the other hand, the certification provides a set of processes that
organizations in the same industry must be compared against. The ITIL is an ITSM
framework that is widely adopted in the world and focuses on aligning IT services with the
business requirements (Iden & Eikebrokk, 2014b).
The management framework that ISO/IEC 20000 applies are called service
management system (SMS) and are the minimum or mandatory requirements. They comprise
of management responsibility, documentation management, resource management,
governance of the processes operated by other parties and establish the SMS. There are many
organizations that are implementing the IT Service Management Service (ITSMS) based on
ISO 20000 and lasts for three years. After the completion of three years, the company is
required to undergo a reassessment audit to receive the accreditation for another three years
(Müller & Lichtenberg, 2018).
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