Enabler: Servicios, Infraestructura y Aplicaciones

COBIT 5 Enabler: Services, Infrastructure and Applications

Service capabilities refer to resources such as applications and infrastructures that are leveraged in the delivery of IT-related services.

The specifics for the service capabilities enabler compared to the generic enabler description are shown in figure 37.

The services, infrastructure and applications model shows:

• Stakeholders—Service capabilities (the combined term for services, infrastructure and applications) stakeholders

can be internal and external. Services can be delivered by internal or external parties—internal IT departments, operations managers, outsourcing providers. Users of services can also be internal— business users—and external to the enterprise—partners, clients, suppliers. The stakes of each of the stakeholders need to be identified and will either be focussed on delivering adequate services or on receiving requested services from providers.

• Goals—Goals of the service level capability will be expressed in terms of services—applications, infrastructure, technology—and service levels, considering which services and service levels are most economical for the enterprise. Again, goals will relate to the services and how they are provided, as well as their outcomes, i.e., contribution towards successfully supported business processes.

• Life cycle—Service capabilities have a life cycle. The future or planned service capabilities are typically described in a target architecture. It covers the building blocks, such as future applications and the target infrastructure model, and also describes the linkages and relationships amongst these building blocks.

The current service capabilities that are used or operated to deliver current IT services are described in a baseline architecture. Depending on the time frame of the target architecture, a transition architecture may also be defined, which shows the enterprise at incremental states between the target and baseline architectures.

• Good practices—Good practice for service capabilities includes:

– Definition of architecture principles—Architecture principles are overall guidelines that govern the implementation and

use of IT-related resources within the enterprise. Examples of potential architecture principles are:

• Reuse—Common components of the architecture should be used when designing and implementing solutions as

part of the target or transition architectures.

• Buy vs. build—Solutions should be purchased unless there is an approved rationale for developing them internally.

Personal Copy of: JESUS ANTONIO DURAN ACEVEDO

85

86

• Simplicity—The enterprise architecture should be designed and maintained to be as simple as possible while still meeting enterprise requirements.

• Agility—The enterprise architecture should incorporate agility to meet changing business needs in an effective and efficient manner.

• Openness—The enterprise architecture should leverage open industry standards.

– The enterprise’s definition of the most appropriate architecture viewpoints to meet the needs of different stakeholders.

These are the models, catalogues and matrices used to describe the baseline, target or transition architectures; for example, an application architecture could be described through an application interface diagram, which shows the applications in use (or planned) and the interfaces amongst them.

– Having an architecture repository, which can be used to store different types of architectural outputs, including architecture principles and standards, architecture reference models, and other architecture deliverables, and which defines the building blocks of services such as:

• Applications, providing

...