Reporting Management

Description/Summary

Reporting Management deals with any kind of Reporting of IT infrastructure and services. A well-defined and controlled process leads to the effective handling of these reports. Reporting Management is triggered every time a request for reporting is received from one of the various processes, from a requester or from an auditor. Reports are also regularly provided.

Each request for Reporting is classified by determining its priority and urgency. In the case of requests for first time reports, the responsible Reporting Authority will decide on whether to approve or dismiss the request. Reporting Management coordinates all incidental tasks within the context of ‚Reporting building, testing and release‘. Close collaboration between Reporting Management and Service Management is important for the success of this process.

Objectives

The purpose of Reporting Management is to establish standardized procedures for the handling of IT-related Reporting requests and to facilitate the processing, scheduling, coordination, documentation and improvement of all reports on IT services and infrastructure.

Reporting Management contributes to an integrated Service Management approach by achieving the following goals:

Every authorized report facilitates the monitoring of services and service quality
Reports facilitate the improvement of services and processes
Reports document service delivery, service quality and service improvement
Reports will communicate service delivery, service quality and service improvement
Reports also ensure legal functions
Every report runs through a set of standardized activities and procedures in order to ensure effective and efficient processing
Every implemented Reporting is documented.

Roles & Functions

Reporting Management Specific Roles

Static Process Roles

Reporting Process Owner: Initiator of the process; accountable for defining the process strategic goals and allocating all required process resources. Refer to Continual Process Improvement Management for a detailed description of these activities.

Reporting Process Manager (Reporting Manager): Manager of the entire process; responsible for its effectiveness and efficiency. Team leader of the function „Reporting Management Team“. Refer to Continual Process Improvement Management for a detailed description of these activities.

Reporting Management Team: The team associated with the Reporting Management Process.

Senior Management: Senior Management of the IT provider.

Dynamic Process Roles

These roles are dynamically created during the Reporting Management Process. See the process-specific or activity-specific rules for further details.

Reporting Owner: The attribute in the record contains the value of the Role/Function currently accountable for that Reporting (but NOT for the Reporting Management Process).

Reporting Agent: The attribute in the record contains the value of the Role/Function currently {responsible en} for either an activity or task within the overall activity of Reporting. The Reporting Agent can be changed with the help of a Functional Escalation, if permitted by the Rules.

Reporting Requester (RReq)

This is the person who triggers the creation of a report. Typically the Requester is either the:

Process Owner
Process Manager
Service Owner
Customer
Account Manager (Customer Owner)

Reporting Receiver (RRcv)

This is the person or group who receives the Final Report. Typically the Receiver is either the:

Process Owner
Process Manager
Service Owner
Customer
Account Manager (Customer Owner)
Process Team Members
Service Experts/Specialists

Reporting Builder: generates the report.

Reporting Validator: validates the report before it is send to the receivers.

Reporting Data Collector: collects and transforms the data from the live system necessary for the reporting.

Service Specific Roles

Roles depending on the affected service are found in the Service Description. The Service Description, including the service specific roles, is delivered from the Service Portfolio Management.

Service Expert/Service Specialist: This person has extensive knowledge about the service.

Service Owner: This is the person responsible for the service as defined in the Service Description.

Customer Specific Roles

Roles depending on the affected customer(s) are found in the Service Level Agreement (SLA) or Customer Record. The Service Level Agreement/Customer Record is maintained by Service Level Agreement Management / Customer Relationship Management.

Customer(s): Customers of the Service

Customer Owner: Account Manager for the Customer

Information artifacts

This section describes information/data required or recorded by the process. In general, a Process Record (here: the Reporting Record) represents the current progress of a process and will contain all information related to the execution of that process.

Reporting Record

The Reporting Record is the record which holds management-relevant information and the history of a specific Reporting. On its creation, filled with information provided by the Report Requester. This includes:

Unique identifier: Reporting ID
Reporting type: process report – only KPIs regarding the process quality are included; service report – only KPIs regarding the service are included; mixed report – both service and process KPIs included
Reporting requester: Name of the Person triggering the Reporting
Reporting Receiver
Status: Status of the Reporting. Is set when passing a Control Activity
Services: Service which is reported
Process: Process which is reported
Reporting Description: The description of the Reporting including the source of the Target Values
Reporting Period
Reporting Due Date
Reporting Owner
Reporting Agent
Reporting sources
Additional Remarks: Text for additional information
Reporting Frequency
Reporting Priority

Forward Schedule of Reporting (FSR)

The FSR is a structured report which refers to all scheduled reports. It contains user and customer relevant information and thus offers a constricted view on all reports planned. Information that is included in the FSR is:

Unique identifier of the Reporting
Planned Date of Report Creation
Description of the Reporting
Report Receiver
Report Requester
Report Frequency

Accomplished Reporting Overview

The Accomplished Reporting Overview is a structured overview providing a view on all created reports. This overview should contain the following information:

Unique identifier of the Reporting
Date of Report Creation
Description of the Reporting
Report Receiver
Report Requester
Report Frequency

Key Concepts

Reporting Priority

Reports are classified by the following priorities:

basic: the report need to be executed following in basic order
superior: the report has higher priority and needs to be executed in first row

Reporting Frequency

Reports are classified by the following frequencies:

regular: the report is executed according to a regular schedule, often on a periodical basis
exceptional: the report is executed on exceptional basis and often is triggered by an exceptional business or service situation

Reporting Classification

Classification of reports are performed by the Reporting Management Staff in cooperation with the Service Expert/Specialist and the requester for that report. Parameters that need to be regarded are:

Business need for a report
Influence from preceding reports on system performance
Resources needed to generate that report
The current resources situation
Side effects and the correlation of that report with other reports scheduled

Process

High Level Process Flow Chart

This chart illustrates the Reporting Management process and its activities. It also shows the status model reflected by the Reporting Record evolution.

Critical Success Factors

Critical Success Factors (CSF):

Resources needed for the processing of reports
Definition of report parameters from the business point of view
Communication and coordination between Business and IT
Understanding of business issues by the IT side
Access to necessary data sources

Performance Indicators (KPI)

Report duration time
Number of loops between IT and business until report is approved on structure and result
Duration of reports processing
Divergence between real time and reported time period
ratio between regular and exceptional report

All KPIs can measured per service, per customer, per location etc.

Process Trigger

Event Trigger

Any request for Reporting from (these roles can act as Reporting Requestor):
- Any Process Manager or Process Owner
- Any Service Owner
- Senior Management
- Customer and Customer Owner (Account Manager)

Time Trigger

Reports are often time triggered and processed on regular basis. Regular Reports are defined in the:
- Process Description
- Service Description
- Service Level Agreements (SLA)
- Operational Level Agreements (OLA)
- Underpinning Contracts

Process Specific Rules

every RFR triggers the creation of a new Reporting Record
the Reporting Agent is responsible for documenting each activity in the Reporting Record
the Reporting Owner must control the Reporting Agent
the Reporting Owner and Reporting Agent can only transfer their duties if the new person or group agrees
the subsequent Reporting Owner or Reporting Agents must then be recorded in the appropriate attribute in the Reporting Record.
the Reporting Owner and Reporting Agent should preferably be a person rather than a group.

Note: for the different types of rules refer to Rules.

Process Activities

Report Requirements Engineering

In this activity, the Reporting Agent is defined. The Report Requester details are also confirmed.

Firstly, it is checked that the Report Requester is authorized to make a request for a new, changed or existing report. If authorization is missing then the request is refused.

Diverse variables need to be taken into account when defining the report. This includes:

business needs provided by the Business Requester
resource availabilities of the Reporting Management Staff and Experts from Service Operations
other reports that are scheduled to be provided by Reporting Management Staff

The report needs to use this information and define what business requirements are best. It should also take into account:

cost of reporting
existing resources framework
other business requirements

The report needs to be defined, approved by the requester, tested in the test system with life data and then approved again by the requester. All the necessary processes and systems need to be instructed to collect the required data for the report.

The report then is submitted into the production system. The final approval from the requester can be provided after the first production run.

Activity Specific Rules

Reporting Owner is set to „Reporting Management Team“ if no other person as Reporting Owner available
Reporting Agent is set to Reporting Owner if if no ther person as Reporting Owner available
Reporting Receiver is recorded.
Reporting Requester is set to the person who has triggered the Reporting
Reporting Builder is defined from the Reporting Management staff or Service Expert/Specialist Group
Reporting Validator is defined and must be different from the Reporting Builder.
Reporting Data Collector is defined from the Service Expert/Specialist Group
Reporting Description must contain a meaningful description of the desired Reporting, as well as a comprehensible rationale stating the reasons for the Reporting.
Reporting Priority is set to „standard“ if no other priority is known.
Set Service and/or Customer and/or Process
Set Reporting Frequency
Set Reporting Type
Set Reporting Period
Set Reporting Due Date
Define Reporting data sources
Set Status to „engineered“

Report Data Collection

In this activity, the data is collected from various sources. This collection is then reviewed in order to determine whether it has been successful.

Activity Specific Rules

set Reporting Agent to Reporting Data Collector
select data from the different sources
extract data and store it in the reporting database
review all data – this is a plausibility check
set status to „collected“

Report Generation

The report generation is processed by the Reporting Builder. The resulting report is then provided to the Report Validator for validation.

Activity Specific Rules

at the beginning, the Reporting Agent is set to Reporting Builder
the report is created out of the data in the the reporting database according to the requirements
set Status to „generated“

Report Validation

The validation compares generated report against the requirements. The comparison may have following results:

„validated – successful“
„validated – not successful“

Activity Specific Rules

the Reporting Agent is set to Reporting Validator
perform validation against the requirements
if the report is approved
- set Status to „validated – successful“ and continue with the next activity
else
- document reason
- set status to „validated – not successful“

Report Publishing and Approval

The report is send to all receivers for approval and/or will be presented to the receiver. If all reporting receivers approve the report, no further actions need to be taken. If any of the receivers deny approval, the Reporting Requirements Engineering will be retriggered.

Depending on the receiver’s approval comments and the type of the report, one or more of the following processes need to be triggered:

Contineous Process Improvement Management Process (anomalies regarding the process quality, e.g. 1st level support does not reach first resolution rate).
Service Portfolio Management Process (e.g. anomalies as regards content of the report have been identified, for example anomalies between index values and actual values)
Change Management Process (e.g. collect new data for next reporting period).

Note: the approval is concerning the formal report (e.g. report contains the agreed content, is presented in the agreed form etc.) and not regarding any anomalies of the reporting values.

Activity Specific Rules

the Reporting Agent is set to Report Receivers
Update the Report Record
If formal criteria is not met or more information/more data for a drill-down is necessary then
- document reason for new or changed requirement
- set status to „published – not approved“
else
- trigger processes as required for contineous improvement
- set status to „published – approved“

Report Closure

In this activity, the Reporting is documented in the Reporting Database.

Activity Specific Rules

the Reporting Agent is set to Reporting Owner
Update the Report Record
Set status to „closed“