A Question on Problem Management

Unified Oil has spent six months reviewing proposals and finally selected a vendor to build the customer facing web portal. In order to support the specialized needs in each region, this application will be deployed in three locations - Plano, Pasadena and Pittsburgh. All of these instances will share a common code base but each will have unique customizations to fit the local markets.

The newly hired project manager is very interested in your opinion. She needs to evaluate whether to channel all customer problems to one location or let each refinery manage their own communication with the software vendor. As an ITIL consultant, your opinion is highly valued and viewed as being objective. The project manager would like you to prepare a written response to the following questions.

Since you believe that this is an opportunity for Unified Oil to implement Problem Management, please describe three areas where Problem Management is relevant to the rollout of this new web interface. (12 points)

Also, provide a concise justification that can be included in a proposal to the board of directors. Will this initiative cost the company more money on top of the software contract or can Problem Management be implemented without additional expenditures? (8 points)

For this assignment:

• Write your answer neatly - do not type this one
• Prepare your study notes in advance, but do not do refine your outline yet
• Now spend no more than 15-minutes refining your outline
• Write your answer long hand. Take as long as you need to do this neatly.
• Count the words and decide how many words you typically write per page