Companies generate profitable revenue as a result of executing business processes. Over the last few decades, business processes have become more and more automated, requiring more and more IT services. In addition, new IT technologies have enabled new business processes that couldn’t exist before. The Internet, and Web technology are great examples. This business process automation has resulted in tremendous increases in productivity and increased profitability, tightening the link between the business and the IT services that support it. As a result, the availability and performance features of the business service have become more critical. Business Service Management (BSM) links IT services to the business needs, minimizing risk to the business by proactively managing the technology that the services depend upon and by detecting problems before they impact end users. What happens when poor performance affects business? The results are often increased costs or lost revenue. Let’s consider a few real-life examples. ■ A bank that has come to depend on its customer selfservice options experiences response degradation in its Internet banking application, causing customers to revert to the call center for fulfillment. A call center inquiry costs the company $2.50, while an online inquiry costs the business $.25. With 1.5 million users, and 1% requiring call center support, this bank sees an annual cost increase of $1.1M.1 ■ An auto dealer requires a 30-second response on loan approvals or loses 40% of the business to competitors. At $125 average earnings per loan and 17,000 lost loan accounts a year, the company loses $2.1M annualized earnings.1 ■ A medium to large-size call center estimates that every 6-second increase in call handling time costs them $330,000 in revenue.2 BSM directly monitors the health of the services that drive your business and generate revenue. Every business has a ......