ITIL V3 service lifecycle has the following five phases and a core publications
- Service Strategy
- Service Design
- Service Transition
- Service Operation
- Continual Service Improvement
Each publication describes the following information related to the lifecycle phases and processes.
- Basic concepts
- Purpose
- Goals & objectives
- Scope
- Value to business
- Inputs
- Activities
- Outputs
- Interfaces
- Roles and responsibilities
- Key performance indicators and metrics
- Technology and automation
Service Strategy
This publication is aimed at the CIO level and answers the questions: what services are we going to provide? Do we have the capabilities and resources? How do we gain competitive advantage?
Key processes: Service Strategy Generation, Financial Management for IT services, Demand Management, Service Portfolio Management and business relationship management.
Key principles: Value (utility and warranty), service assets (resources and capabilities), service provider types, value networks.
Service Design
This publication is aimed at development and design of services and answers the questions: How are we going to provide it? How are we going to build it? How are we going to test it? How are we going to deploy it?
Key processes: design coordination, service catalogue management, service level management, capacity management, availability management, service continuity management and information security management.
Key principles: Service portfolio design, technology and architectural design, measurement, people and processes, tools and suppliers.
Service Transition
This publication aims to set correct customer expectations and to minimize risk and impact during transition.
Key processes: Change management, change evaluation management, release management, service asset and configuration management, knowledge management, service validation & testing management, and service transition management.
Key principles: service transition policies, communications, organizational change, stakeholder management, deployment models, data-Information-Knowledge-Wisdom.
Service Operations
This publication aims to efficiently and effectively manage day-to-day operations of services.
Key processes: Incident management, problem management, service request management, access management and event management.
Functions: Service desk, technical management, application management, operation management.
Key principles: Stability vs. responsiveness, quality vs. cost, reactive vs. proactive
Continual Service Improvement
This publication aims to ensure that service management processes continue to support the business objectives.
Key processes: The seven Step improvement process
Key principles: Ownership, continual service improvement register, external and internal drivers, service level management, knowledge management, Deming lifecycle and six-sigma concepts.