Creating and managing change requests using Smart IT

Initiate and record

Smart IT provides a wizard-like interface for creating change requests with or without a change template. The wizard helps you provide essential information about the change, such as its class (standard, normal, no impact, emergency, expedited, latent), affected configuration items (CIs), scheduled dates, risk level, and supporting documents. After you have provided a minimum set of data, you can save the change request as Draft.

Some fields are filled in automatically for you, even if you do not use a template. For example, the system assumes that you are requesting the change for yourself, and the company and location information defaults to your company and location. If you have the role of Change Coordinator in your support group, you are automatically assigned as the change coordinator for the change request. If you use a template, values in the template take precedence over system defaults. While the change request is in Draft status, you can also manually update values in all fields. As the change progresses through the stages of its lifecycle, and depending on the class of change, certain fields cannot be updated. For more information, see Implement.

The wizard allows you to search for CIs based on filter criteria such as CI type, company, keyword, or owner. In the universal client, search results appear in chunks of 100 CIs. You can select individual CIs, a chunk of 100 CIs, or all CIs returned in the search, and relate them to the change request.

You can initiate multiple, parallel searches to find CIs as quickly as possible. In the universal client, you can also save your CI search criteria as presets, so you can more easily run the same CI searches again. You can retrieve CI search presets from the universal client and from mobile clients.

An appropriate risk level is provided if you create the change request by using a template. You can also have the system calculate the risk level by answering questions that the administrator has configured, or you can manually select a risk level from 1 (lower risk) to 5 (higher risk). If you need to perform impact analysis (for example, by using the BMC Atrium Impact Simulator) or if you want to generate risk reports, you must use the mid-tier-based UI for the BMC Change Management application in the BMC Remedy IT Service Management (ITSM) Suite. See "Atrium Impact Simulator analysis for change requests" and "Working with reports" in Related topics.

You can provide various kinds of documentation for a change request in Smart IT, such as a Business Justification, Technical Design, Backout Plan, and Test Plan. You must determine the type and number of documents that are needed based on the class of change and the requirements of your organization. You can enter information as text or you can upload files. People reviewing and updating the change can also add notes, such as the results of installation processes and testing.

Review and authorize

Designated approvers can review change request details and approve or reject the change by using Smart IT. For more information, see "Approving change requests" in Related topics.

Plan and schedule

You can schedule dates for the changes in Smart IT based on your knowledge and research of planned releases, changes, and outages, or you can simply specify a date by which the change should be completed. If you need to use a robust change calendar that shows all changes and outages in the system for affected CIs, or if you want to perform collision detection, you must use the mid-tier-based UI for the BMC Change Management application in the BMC Remedy ITSM Suite. See "Using the Calendar" and "Using Collision Detection" in Related topics.

After you save the initial draft of a change request, you can link related tickets such as changes, incidents, and service requests (see "Scenarios for creating tickets using Smart IT" in Related topics). If the change request was created from an incident or service request, that ticket is automatically linked as a related item. To link a change request to other types of related requests (such as problem investigations and known errors), you must use the mid-tier-based UI for the BMC Change Management application in the BMC Remedy ITSM Suite.

You can also link outages to the change request, by relating an existing outage or creating a new outage (see "Relating items to the current ticket" in Related topics). CIs associated with the outage are automatically related to the change request and appear in Configuration Items on the change request details. (If you later remove the related outage, the associated CIs remain related to the change request. However, if you remove a CI that has an associated outage, then the relationships of both the CI and the outage are removed from the change request.)

While planning the change request, you can also create tasks. See Implement for more information.

Implement

The work needed to complete a change is accomplished through the use of tasks. A task represents a specific set of steps and is assigned to a task implementer. The task implementer can locate assigned tasks by using the Ticket Console. If you use a change template to create a change request, any tasks that are needed to complete the change are automatically included. After the change is initiated, you can also add and assign tasks by using task and task group templates, or by adding ad hoc tasks. For more information, see "Adding tasks to tickets in Smart IT" in Related topics.

Complete and close

In Smart IT, the change request lifecycle is managed through status transitions. For example, when you want to obtain business approval for a change request, set the status to Request for Authorization. Depending on the class of change and the status value, you cannot modify certain details in a change request. For example, when the status is Request for Authorization, you cannot modify the class, risk level, categorization, and other information, because doing so would recharacterize the scope and impact of the change.

Some status transitions occur automatically. For example, when all of the tasks have been completed, the change request status changes to Completed. After recording the actual dates for the change and entering any final notes, you can set the status to Closed.