Planning and phases of a CMDB implementation

This section helps you understand the best practices for planning the loading, normalization, and reconciliation of data in the BMC CMDB. 

CMDB implementation planning stages

The following information helps you understand the stages involved in structuring a CMDBBMC CMDB project and successfully delivering a comprehensive, effective, and useful CMDB. These stages are set forth in the Step-by-Step Guide to Building a CMDB and are summarized here. You can request this book from https://www.bmc.com/forms/cmdb-step-by-step-guide.html.

The stages are further divided into discrete steps, each with specific goals and objectives that help you meet the milestone for each stage. Some aspects of this process are described in more detail in this document and in other BMC Software documentation, as noted in this section.

Stage 1 Assembling the project team

The number of team members that you choose and how many roles each plays depends on the size and structure of your organization, but you should employ project management standards such as including stakeholders and representatives from the user community. 

The high-level steps associated with this stage are:

• Step 1, Assemble project team
• Step 2, Obtain CMDB knowledge
• Step 3, Create and agree on CMDB goals and mission statement
• Step 4, Review and define benefits
• Step 5, Build a business case

Your Configuration Management team should collectively be knowledgeable in:

• ITIL Service Support processes and guidelines
• CMDB administration, BMC recommendations, and integration methods
• The BMC CMDB Common Data Model (CDM)
• Remedy AR System development
• Project management
• Business management processes

Stage 2: Defining requirements and creating IT service model blueprint

The high-level steps associated with this stage are:

• Step 6, Identify and review governance requirements
• Step 7, Review and select supporting recommendations
• Step 8, Identify requirements to address potential problems
• Step 9, Identify inventory and asset requirements
• Step 10, Define service catalog requirements
• Step 11, Define CMDB requirements to support other processes
• Step 12, Define configuration item (CI) level and IT service model
• Step 13, Define CI relationships
• Step 14, Define CI attributes
• Step 15, Design IT service model blueprint

The result of these steps is a blueprint that models your configuration data requirements.

For information about the complete structure and class details of the Common Data Model (CDM), see the BMC CMDB Common Data Model Diagram and the BMC CMDB Data Model Help in the PDFs and videos page.

Stage 3: Selecting CMDB solution and tools

The high-level steps associated with this stage are:

• Step 16, Select CMDB solution
• Step 17, Plan the CMDB population
  For details about this step, see Planning to populate BMC CMDB.
• Step 18, Select tools to automate CMDB population
• Step 19, Calculate project Return on Investment (ROI)

Stage 4: Constructing and maintaining your CMDB

The high-level steps associated with this stage are:

• Step 20, Construct your CMDB
• Step 21, Create CI lifecycle management processes
• Step 22, Build supporting processes
• Step 23, Populate your CMDB
  For details about this step, see Populating data in BMC CMDB.
• Step 24, Train the CMDB team and users

Stage 5: Driving ongoing value

The high-level steps associated with this stage are:

• Step 25, Implement measures and metrics
• Step 26, Create a continual service improvement program

Phased implementation of a CMDB

Implementing a CMDB to manage your entire configuration at once is a daunting task, so a phased approach to implementation is usually better. Consider the following alternatives for breaking up the implementation:

• By critical business services or critical business applications
• By company department
• By geographic region
• By support group
• By importance of CI

Regardless of which types of phases that you use, try to keep transition times short. While in transition, you must maintain both your current and former processes, which is difficult to do for long periods. 

Your later phases will be less costly if you apply lessons learned in early phases.

Related topics

ITIL service asset and configuration management

Challenges, critical success factors, and risks with SACM