Service-orientation and the underlying concept of service-oriented architectures are a means to successfully address the need for flexibility and interoperability of software applications, which in turn leads to improved IT support of business processes. With a growing level of diffusion, sophistication and maturity, the number of services and interdependencies is gradually rising. This increasingly requires companies to implement a systematic management of services along their entire lifecycle. Service lifecycle management (SLM), i.e., the management of services from the initiating idea to their disposal, is becoming a crucial success factor. Not surprisingly, the academic and practice communities increasingly postulate comprehensive IT support for SLM to counteract the inherent complexity. The topic is still in its infancy, with no comprehensive models available that help evaluating and designing IT support in SLM. This thesis presents a reference architecture for SLM and applies it to the evaluation and designing of SLM IT support in companies. The artifact, which largely resulted from consortium research efforts, draws from an extensive analysis of existing SLM applications, case studies, focus group discussions, bilateral interviews and existing literature. Formal procedure models and a configuration terminology allow adapting and applying the reference architecture to a company’s individual setting. Corresponding usage examples prove its applicability and demonstrate the arising benefits within various SLM IT support design and evaluation tasks. A statistical analysis of the knowledge embodied within the reference data leads to novel, highly significant findings. For example, contemporary standard applications do not yet emphasize the lifecycle concept but rather tend to focus on small parts of the lifecycle, especially on service operation. This forces user companies either into a best-of-breed or a custom-development strategy if they are to implement integrated IT support for their SLM activities. SLM software vendors and internal software development units need to undergo a paradigm shift in order to better reflect the numerous interdependencies and increasing intertwining within services’ lifecycles. The SLM architecture is a first step towards achieving this goal.:Content Overview List of Figures....................................................................................... xi List of Tables ...................................................................................... xiv List of Abbreviations.......................................................................xviii 1 Introduction .................................................................................... 1 2 Foundations ................................................................................... 13 3 Architecture Structure and Strategy Layer .............................. 57 4 Process Layer ................................................................................ 75 5 Information Systems Layer ....................................................... 103 6 Architecture Application and Extension ................................. 137 7 Results, Evaluation and Outlook .............................................. 195 Appendix ..........................................................................................203 References .......................................................................................... 463 Curriculum Vitae.............................................................................. 498 Bibliographic Data............................................................................ 499

Den snabba teknikutvecklingen i samhället beskrivs ofta som den största förklaringen till agila principers snabba framväxt bland IT-organisationer under de senare åren. Agila arbetsmetoder går ofta ut på att arbetet planeras i kortare iterationer där leverantören kontinuerligt stämmer av kundkraven mellan sprintarna. Ramverket ITIL är även det ett vanligt hjälpmedel IT- organisationer använder sig av för att organisera sitt arbete. Den mest använda ITIL praktiken är change management som beskriver hur verksamheter kan organisera hanteringen av ändringarna som de driftsätter. Change management processen är, tillskilland från agila arbetssätt, av sekventiellnatur. Vanliga fördomar om ITIL och change managementprocessen är att det ofta uppfattas som byråkratiskt, icke flexibelt och som agila principers raka motsats. Dock har det visat sig i denna studie att ITIL och agila arbetssätt faktiskt kan komplettera varandra mycket bra om de implementeras på rätt sätt.  Polisens IT-avdelning står inför utmaningen att få processen ur kundens perspektiv att vara effektiv och enkel att ta sig igenom trots att processen innefattar både agila team och en grupp som arbetar enligt ITILs change management, vilket ses som ett problem av fallorganisationen. Syftet med denna kvalitativa fallstudie var därmed att identifiera sätt som dessa två olika grupper kan samverka för att processen ska bli mindre komplex för kund. För att uppnå fallstudiens syfte utfördes en litteraturstudie för att undersöka vad interna kunder värderar, hur en change managementprocess med höga säkerhetskrav kan fungera i en agil verksamhet samt olika processförbättringsverktyg. Vidare utfördes intervjuer och observationer för att samla in de interna kundernas uppfattning av nulägesprocessen samt visualisera processen i en nulägeskarläggning. Dessa analyserades sedan med hjälp av teorin från litteraturstudien.  Studien resulterade dels i 24 identifierade problemområden med tillhörande förbättringsförslag. Sedan presenterades ett specifikt förbättringsförslag för hur change managementgruppen och ett agilt team kan agera mer som en enhet ur kundens perspektiv. Detta förslag skulle kunna vara ett lämpligt första steg för hur fallorganisationen kan effektivare kombinera sitt agila arbete i värdeflödet med change managementgruppen som arbetar efter en ITIL-process. Förslaget skulle bland annat kunna medföra minskat antal kontaktytor för kund, eliminerat dubbelarbete samt minskad ledtid. Andra förbättringsförslag som tagits fram är främst kopplat till förenkling av kommunikation, samverkan av likande aktiviteter, skapa förutsättningar för gemensamt ansvar och prioriteringar. Slutligen presenteras även vikten av att kontinuerligt identifiera de interna kunders behov. Detta eftersom det är en förutsättning för att fallorganisationen ska kunna arbeta med ständiga förbättringar av processen och för att säkerställa att processerna ständigt möter kundernas eventuellt förändrande behov. / The accelerated technological development in society is often described as the biggest explanation for the fast growth of agile principles among IT organizations in recent years. Agile methods often involve the work being planned in shorter iterations where the supplier continuously matches the customer requirements between the sprints. The ITIL framework is also a common tool that IT organizations use to organize their work. The most used ITIL practice is change management, which describes how companies can organize the reviewing of the changes they plan on putting into their production environment. The change management process is, unlike agile methods, of a sequential nature. Common prejudices about ITIL and the change management process are that it is often perceived as bureaucratic, inflexible and as the exact opposite of agile principles. However, it has been found in this study that ITIL and agile actually can complement each other very well if implemented correctly.  The Swedish police's IT department now faces the challenge of making their process easier and more efficient to get through, from the perspective of their internal customers, even though the process includes both agile teams and a group that works according to ITIL's change management. This is perceived as a big problem by the case organization. The purpose of this qualitative case study was thus to identify ways in which these two different groups can work together to make the process less complex for the customer. To achieve the purpose of the case study, a literature study was conducted to examine what internal customers value, how a change management process with high security requirements can work in an agile organization and various process improvement tools. Furthermore, interviews and observations were performed to collect the internal customers' perception of the current process and to visualize the current process in a process map. These were then analyzed by using the theory from the literature study.  The study resulted in 24 identified problem areas with associated improvement proposals. Then a specific improvement suggestion was presented for how change management and an agile team can act more as one unit from the customers’ perspective. This proposal could be an appropriate first step for the case organization to combine its agile work in the value stream with the change management group working after an ITIL process. The proposal could, among other things, lead to a reduced number of contact areas for customers, eliminate duplication of work and reduce the lead time. Other improvement proposals that have been developed are mainly linked to simplifications of communication, collaboration of similar activities, creating conditions for joint responsibility and priorities. Finally, the importance of continuously identifying the internal customers' needs is stated since it is a condition for the case organization to be able to work with continuous improvements of the process. Being able to change the process is necessary to be able to meet the customers’ potentially changed future needs.

Цель работы – разработка, реализация и внедрение системы управления IT-услугами, позволяющей повысить качество и скорость работы технического отдела компании. Объект исследования – класс ITSM-систем, позволяющих управлять работой IT-отдела компании. Методы исследования: анализ и сравнение существующих систем управления IT-услугами; анализ современных средств разработки WEB-приложений; тестирование разрабатываемой системы на реальных пользователях и реальных данных. Результаты работы: разработана система управления IT-услугами (ITSM) для компании по предотвращению магазинных краж. Доказана эффективность внедрения новой системы. Выпускная квалификационная работа выполнена в текстовом редакторе Microsoft Word и представлена в твёрдой копии. / The goal of the work is to develop, implement and implement an IT service management system that will improve the quality and speed of work of the company’s technical department. The object of study is a class of ITSM systems that allow you to manage the work of a company’s IT department. Research methods: analysis and comparison of existing IT service management systems; analysis of modern WEB application development tools; testing the developed system on real users and real data. Work results: an IT service management (ITSM) system was developed for a shoplifting prevention company. The effectiveness of implementing the new system has been proven. The final qualifying work was completed in the text editor Microsoft Word and presented in a hard copy.

Made available in DSpace on 2016-04-25T16:45:14Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Daniela Wariss Monteiro.pdf: 2225041 bytes, checksum: 8895c4a5f8d078eae0cbc8cfc5856db0 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2009-02-18 / The goal of this work is to analyze by means of a case study the IT governance processes in a mobile phone company. First, it intends to verify if the controls required by these processes incur in bureaucratic dysfunctions and then to suggest ways for a gradually effective implementation. In order to comprehend how a certain implementation was made, it was carryed out a comparative between the situation before and after of the implementation. Also, interviews were done to verify if the individuals who work on the organization were satisfied with the result. The choice of the mobile phone sector is due to the large investments in technological and procedural innovations and to the strategic role played by IT within this sector, which aggregates value to the company. Since technological processes have been decisive in IT and in the whole company, IT area is not more only that one that provides technological services but plays a fundamental role in the general structure of the company. Dealing with the present case, some questions arise: Is IT governance effective or it has become a merely bureaucratic process? Are there advantages in its implantation? Do the individuals need to be prepared for the change? Does the market require these modifications? Are the certifications important to the phone companies? Has the quality of deliveries improved? Are the controls more effective without the utilization of frameworks? If they are, how do these controls burden the company? What kind of improvements could be done to make IT governance processes better? In order to answer such questions, a theoretical study on IT governance and bureaucracy has been done aiming to investigate their similarities and find out that some bureaucratic dysfunctions are present also in governance, even tough this kind of problems tends to be not considered or even neglected , preventing critical attitudes necessary to find practices solutions / O objetivo desta dissertação é analisar, mediante estudo de caso, os processos de governança de TI em uma organização de telefonia móvel. Pretende-se, em primeiro lugar, verificar se os controles exigidos por esses processos incorrem em disfunções burocráticas e, depois, sugerir caminhos para uma implementação gradualmente eficaz. Buscando compreender como uma determinada implementação foi efetuada, realizou-se um comparativo entre a situação antes e depois de tal implementação, além de aplicação de entrevistas a fim de verificar se os indivíduos que trabalham na organização ficaram satisfeitos com o resultado. Escolheu-se o setor de telefonia móvel porque é um segmento que possui grandes investimentos em inovações tecnológicas e processuais, dentro do qual a área de TI possui um papel estratégico agregando valor para a organização. Na verdade, como os processos tecnológicos tornam-se determinantes para o funcionamento da área de TI e, conseqüentemente, para a própria organização, a área de tecnologia passa a desempenhar um papel fundamental na estrutura geral da organização, deixando de ser apenas aquela que provê serviços técnicos. Diante do caso em questão surgem questionamentos como: a governança de TI é eficaz ou se tornou apenas um processo burocrático? Existem vantagens na sua implantação? Os indivíduos precisam estar preparados para a mudança? O mercado exige essas modificações? As certificações são importantes às empresas de telefonia? A qualidade dos entregáveis melhorou? Os controles são mais efetivos sem a utilização dos frameworks? Se sim, em que onera a organização efetivar estes controles? Quais melhorias podem ser feitas para aperfeiçoar os processos de governança de TI? Para responder a tais perguntas foi efetuado um estudo teórico tanto de governança de TI, como de burocracia, no intuito de investigar suas similaridades e de perceber que algumas disfunções burocráticas também existem na governança, embora problemas do tipo tendam a ser desconsiderados ou mesmo negligenciados , dificultando a tomada de postura crítica necessária para se buscar soluções práticas

The main topic of this thesis is IT innovation management which is very up to date theme as a research within the thesis documents. IT innovation should be managed jointly with the IT Governance to support effectiveness of IT and competitiveness of the whole company.

IT service management (ITSM) has emerged as one of the approaches to implementing IT Governance in Australian Universities. A number of ITSM frameworks have been proposed however, IT Infrastructure Library (ITIL) and Control OBjectives for Information and related Technology (COBIT) have been most widely accepted and implemented internationally and within Australia. The research reported in this thesis was undertaken to shed light on the issues related to ITIL adoption and implementation within Australian universities. To date academic research in ITIL adoption and implementation has not been extensive as it is comparatively a new framework, especially within Australian universities. The theoretical framework proposed in this thesis has IT service management as the central concept, implementing IT Governance to align the university and technology. This framework is used to examine the experience of ITIL adoption in seven Australian universities, plus a detailed case study on one university�s experience. This research reveals a complex web of factors relating to ITIL implementation including; the pre-implementation process; processes implemented; order of implementation; hiring external expertise;, tool selection;, staff training; ongoing assessments; managing cultural change; managing learning curve and resource strain. The findings provide an insight into practical lessons for other Australian universities or similar organisations considering implementing IT Governance through IT Service management frameworks. The method used in this research may be useful for other organisations and researchers analysing universities and similar organisations implementing ITIL. IT Governance and IT service management frameworks are diverse and important areas which open a poorly researched field for further work.

<p>This report was made for the company HordaGruppen AB to investigate how information security was handled. This report fits in the Master program of Internet Technology at School of Engineering in Jönköping University in Sweden.</p><p>The question at issue was how you protect your information against different threats. One question was how to make an information security policy and which guidelines you can follow in the Swedish Standard, SS-ISO/IEC 17799:2000.</p><p>Another question was to investigate the information sources at the company and which threats there are against it.</p><p>The work begins with a presentation about information security for the chief of information and the chief of quality in the company. The next thing was to do a survey of as thing are at present with a tool from Länsteknikcentrum called “Infosäkpulsen”. After the analysis was made of the survey, two reports were present with action plan for better information security for the company. The most important measures were of administrative kind and consist of a risk analysis of information resources and to make an information security policy with instructions for the users.</p><p>The risk analysis was made with the tool BITS from Krisberedskapsmyndigheten and the consequence was that base level for IT-security was enough for the company.</p><p>To fulfil the demand from the analyses so was an information security policy made and after that so create we information security instructions for the different kind of user group. One instruction was for ordinary users and the other was for management users.</p><p>Besides the part with policy and instructions so recommend the company to initiate incident management and register all kind of changes in their IT-system.</p><p>For further research it suggests to investigate how different standards can integrate to be only one standard that fulfils the goals in quality, environment and security standard</p> / <p>Rapporten var gjord som examensarbete på HordaGruppen AB och ingår i Breddmagisterprogrammet i Internetteknik på Ingenjörshögskolan i Jönköping.</p><p>Problemställningen som rapporten handlar om är hur man skyddar företagets information mot olika sorters hot. Frågeställningen var dels hur man tar fram en informationssäkerhetspolicy och vilka riktlinjer det finns i svensk standard för informationssäkerhet. Frågeställningen skulle också ta reda på företagets informationstillgångar och vilka hot det fanns mot dessa.</p><p>Arbetets inleds med en presentation på företaget om informationssäkerhet för Kvalitetschefen och IT-ansvarig. Därefter görs en nulägesanalys över informationssäkerheten med hjälp av verktyget Infosäkpulsen, en enkätundersökning från Länsteknikcentrum i Jönköping AB. Efter att svaren samlats in så sammanställdes en åtgärdsrapport och presenterades för företaget. De åtgärder som ansågs mest aktuella var av det administrativa slaget och bestod i att riskanalysera informationstillgångarna och att ta fram en informationssäkerhetspolicy med anvisningar för användarna.</p><p>Riskanalysen gjordes med verktyget BITS från Krisberedskapsmyndigheten och resulterade i att basnivå för it säkerhet räckte överlag för företaget.</p><p>För att uppfylla kraven från analyserna så togs en informationssäkerhetspolicy fram och därefter skapades informationssäkerhetsanvisningar till användare och till drift och förvaltning för att kunna uppfölja policyn.</p><p>Förutom att följa policyn och anvisningarna så rekommenderas företaget att införa incidenthantering och öka spårbarheten genom att dokumentera vilka ändringar som görs i IT-systemen. Ett uppslag för fortsatt arbete skulle kunna vara att integrera de olika standarderna till en anvisning som uppfyller målen för både kvalitet, miljön och säkerheten.</p>

A gerência adequada de recursos e serviços de Tecnologia da Informação (TI) se tornou imperativa para o sucesso de organizações modernas. A Biblioteca de Infraestrutura de Tecnologia da Informação (Information Technology Infrastructure Library, ITIL) representa, nesse contexto, o framework mais popular para ajudar a alcançar esse fim. Para lidar com mudanças em TI, a ITIL define o processo de gerência de mudanças (change management), cujo principal objetivo é garantir que métodos e procedimentos padronizados são utilizados para o tratamento imediato e eficiente dessas mudanças. Para alcançar esse objetivo, é fundamental reutilizar a experiência adquirida com mudanças passadas no projeto de requisições futuras. A ITIL sugere o uso de modelos de mudanças (change models) como uma forma para permitir o reuso de tal experiência em mudanças recorrentes e similares. A criação de modelos de mudanças pode ser concretizada considerando duas abordagens distintas. Em uma abordagem top-down, operadores de TI podem projetar os modelos manualmente, com base no conhecimento adquirido no passado. Em uma perspectiva alternativa, bottom-up, esses modelos poderiam ser extraídos a partir de traços de mudanças passadas obtidos com orquestradores de mudanças. Na prática, no entanto, mudanças tem sido geralmente descritas e documentadas de forma ad hoc, devido `a falta de mecanismos adequados para apoiar o projeto das mesmas. Isso impede que o conhecimento adquirido na especificação, planejamento e condução de mudanças passadas seja reutilizado em requisições futuras. Para abordar esse problema, nesta dissertação são propostos (i ) o conceito de templates de mudança como um mecanismo para formalizar, preservar, e (re)usar conhecimento na especificação de mudanças recorrentes e similares, (ii ) um algoritmo para o refinamento automatizado de planos de mudanças em workflows executáveis, (iii ) um mecanismo para extrair templates de mudanças a partir de traços de execuções passadas, e (iv) uma solução fim-a-fim, apoiada por um sistema real, para permitir o planejamento e implantação de mudanças em TI. Para provar conceito e viabilidade técnica da solução proposta, foi realizada uma implementação prototípica de um sistema de gerência de mudanças chamado ChangeLedge, o qual foi utilizado para conduzir uma série de experimentos considerando mudanças típicas em TI. Os resultados alcançados indicam a efetividade da solução e eficiência do sistema, o qual é capaz de gerar planos de mudança executáveis e corretos em um período de tempo substancialmente menor que o que seria gasto por um operador humano experiente, e de extrair templates que descrevem com acurácia mudanças passadas executadas na organização. / Proper management of Information Technology (IT) resources and services has become imperative for the success of modern organizations. The IT Infrastructure Library (ITIL) represents, in this context, the most widely accepted framework to help achieve this end. In order to deal with IT changes, ITIL defines the change management process, whose main goal is to ensure that standardized methods and procedures are used for the efficient and prompt handling of these changes. To meet this goal, it is of paramount importance reusing the experience acquired from previous changes in the design of subsequent ones. ITIL suggests the use of change models as a mean of enabling the reuse of such experience across recorrent, similar changes. The creation of change models can be done considering two distinct approaches. In a top-down approach, IT operators may manually design models based on the knowledge owned/acquired in the past. In contrast, in a bottom-up perspective, these models could be discovered from past execution traces gathered from IT provisioning tools. In practice, however, changes have been usually described and documented in an ad hoc fashion, due to the lack of proper mechanisms to both support the change design process. This hampers knowledge acquired when specifying, planning, and carrying out previous changes to be reused in subsequent requests. To address this problem, in this thesis we propose (i ) the concept of change templates as a mechanism to formalize, preserve, and (re)use knowledge in the specification of (recurrent and similar) IT changes, (ii ) an algorithm for the automated refinement of change plans into actionable workflows, (iii ) a mechanism to discover change templates from traces of past changes, and (iv) an end-to-end solution, supported by a real system, to allow planning and implementation of IT changes to be designed and executed. To prove concept and technical feasibility of the proposed solution, we have developed a prototypical implementation of a change management system called ChangeLedge and used it to carry out a set of experiments, considering typical IT changes. The results obtained indicate the effectiveness of the solution and efficiency of the system, which is able to generate accurate and actionable change plans in substantially less time than would be spent by a skilled human operator, and to extract templates that accurately describe IT change procedures previously executed in the organization.

Publicación a texto completo no autorizada por el autor / Mejora el proceso actual de gestión de incidencias, aplicando las buenas prácticas de ITIL 2011. El manejo inadecuado de la gestión de incidencias ocasiona tiempos largos para su diagnóstico y resolución, además, no existe un canal centralizado de atención de las incidencias detectados por los usuarios y personal de sistemas; no se cuenta con un procedimiento para poder priorizar, escalar y atender las solicitudes de atención de incidencias. Por ello, es necesario mejorar el actual proceso, dándole un estándar según el modelo propuesto por ITIL 2011, para mejorar la eficiencia del proceso. Si no se logra mejorar el proceso actual, producirá una falta de confianza de los clientes para futuros contratos. Existen actualmente varios modelos que brindaran solución al problema planteado, siendo ITIL 2011 el modelo de gestión de servicios de TI más aceptado internacionalmente por las organizaciones, el cual es seleccionado para el caso de estudio, según los criterios y valores de evaluación que contempla. / Trabajo de suficiencia profesional

A gerência adequada de recursos e serviços de Tecnologia da Informação (TI) se tornou imperativa para o sucesso de organizações modernas. A Biblioteca de Infraestrutura de Tecnologia da Informação (Information Technology Infrastructure Library, ITIL) representa, nesse contexto, o framework mais popular para ajudar a alcançar esse fim. Para lidar com mudanças em TI, a ITIL define o processo de gerência de mudanças (change management), cujo principal objetivo é garantir que métodos e procedimentos padronizados são utilizados para o tratamento imediato e eficiente dessas mudanças. Para alcançar esse objetivo, é fundamental reutilizar a experiência adquirida com mudanças passadas no projeto de requisições futuras. A ITIL sugere o uso de modelos de mudanças (change models) como uma forma para permitir o reuso de tal experiência em mudanças recorrentes e similares. A criação de modelos de mudanças pode ser concretizada considerando duas abordagens distintas. Em uma abordagem top-down, operadores de TI podem projetar os modelos manualmente, com base no conhecimento adquirido no passado. Em uma perspectiva alternativa, bottom-up, esses modelos poderiam ser extraídos a partir de traços de mudanças passadas obtidos com orquestradores de mudanças. Na prática, no entanto, mudanças tem sido geralmente descritas e documentadas de forma ad hoc, devido `a falta de mecanismos adequados para apoiar o projeto das mesmas. Isso impede que o conhecimento adquirido na especificação, planejamento e condução de mudanças passadas seja reutilizado em requisições futuras. Para abordar esse problema, nesta dissertação são propostos (i ) o conceito de templates de mudança como um mecanismo para formalizar, preservar, e (re)usar conhecimento na especificação de mudanças recorrentes e similares, (ii ) um algoritmo para o refinamento automatizado de planos de mudanças em workflows executáveis, (iii ) um mecanismo para extrair templates de mudanças a partir de traços de execuções passadas, e (iv) uma solução fim-a-fim, apoiada por um sistema real, para permitir o planejamento e implantação de mudanças em TI. Para provar conceito e viabilidade técnica da solução proposta, foi realizada uma implementação prototípica de um sistema de gerência de mudanças chamado ChangeLedge, o qual foi utilizado para conduzir uma série de experimentos considerando mudanças típicas em TI. Os resultados alcançados indicam a efetividade da solução e eficiência do sistema, o qual é capaz de gerar planos de mudança executáveis e corretos em um período de tempo substancialmente menor que o que seria gasto por um operador humano experiente, e de extrair templates que descrevem com acurácia mudanças passadas executadas na organização. / Proper management of Information Technology (IT) resources and services has become imperative for the success of modern organizations. The IT Infrastructure Library (ITIL) represents, in this context, the most widely accepted framework to help achieve this end. In order to deal with IT changes, ITIL defines the change management process, whose main goal is to ensure that standardized methods and procedures are used for the efficient and prompt handling of these changes. To meet this goal, it is of paramount importance reusing the experience acquired from previous changes in the design of subsequent ones. ITIL suggests the use of change models as a mean of enabling the reuse of such experience across recorrent, similar changes. The creation of change models can be done considering two distinct approaches. In a top-down approach, IT operators may manually design models based on the knowledge owned/acquired in the past. In contrast, in a bottom-up perspective, these models could be discovered from past execution traces gathered from IT provisioning tools. In practice, however, changes have been usually described and documented in an ad hoc fashion, due to the lack of proper mechanisms to both support the change design process. This hampers knowledge acquired when specifying, planning, and carrying out previous changes to be reused in subsequent requests. To address this problem, in this thesis we propose (i ) the concept of change templates as a mechanism to formalize, preserve, and (re)use knowledge in the specification of (recurrent and similar) IT changes, (ii ) an algorithm for the automated refinement of change plans into actionable workflows, (iii ) a mechanism to discover change templates from traces of past changes, and (iv) an end-to-end solution, supported by a real system, to allow planning and implementation of IT changes to be designed and executed. To prove concept and technical feasibility of the proposed solution, we have developed a prototypical implementation of a change management system called ChangeLedge and used it to carry out a set of experiments, considering typical IT changes. The results obtained indicate the effectiveness of the solution and efficiency of the system, which is able to generate accurate and actionable change plans in substantially less time than would be spent by a skilled human operator, and to extract templates that accurately describe IT change procedures previously executed in the organization.