“IT organizations there are disconnects between the demand and expectations of the business and IT’s ability to supply them. A service catalog correlates the demands of the business to the actual supply of IT in a way that allows for planning, measuring, and management of a service life cycle for both the business and IT,” Hubbert said.
The catalog offers self-servicing to an enterprise so it can identify what IT services it needs and then have their IT departments take care of it, explained Eric Feldman, product marketing manager at CA Technologies. The catalog is for enterprises of all sizes.
Using a catalog like this one by CA Technologies is good for an enterprise because it allows IT to become a broker of cloud services. If IT does not use a catalog to get enterprises required services, the enterprise business management and employees may look elsewhere to get their services, according to Hubbert.
“If IT is not going to implement a service catalog they are missing out on demand and supply governance and on the alignment to the business,” she said.
Service catalogs allow for business stakeholders to understand IT offerings at their companies and lists the prices of services and lists delivery options. Any services demanded by enterprise workers not offered by IT can be documented by IT so it can plan resources needed to help run the business, according to Hubbert.
“The service catalog enables IT to present its actual and present capabilities to avoid missing the business’s expectations,’ Hubbert said.
There are other software vendors with similar service catalogs, such as Palo Alto, Calif.-based Hewlett-Packard Co. and Markham, Ont.-based IBM Canada Ltd., Herndon, Va.-based Axios Systems and Mountain View, Calif.-based Symantec Corp.
