Service Planning for Electronic Messaging Systems (Part I of a Two-Part Series)
By Roger Mizumori, Compaq Computer Corporation, and Mary V. Fisher, ARINC, Incorporated,
reprinted from the 1999 Handbook of Electronic Messaging by Nancy Cox

After establishing the strategic business requirements for a messaging service and defining an infrastructure service to meet those requirements, the next step is to determine how to most effectively plan and manage the service. The resulting service plan describes what will be done, given tactical constraints and requirements, to provide a service consistent with the service architecture. This includes the operational plans for the service, as well as its funding, staffing, and near-term service upgrades. More specifically, the service plan draws a distinction between what is desired from the service and what can be afforded. In essence, this is where user expectations merge with—or diverge from—the realities of what is achievable.

This first article in a two-part series examines two aspects of a messaging service management approach, looking in turn at the functional model, which establishes the various aspects of managing a messaging service, and then at the administrative model, which addresses the day-to-day issues of administering the service. To complete the picture, the second article in this series will examine the management jurisdiction model, which addresses the issues of how to structure the management resources to achieve the best service. In addition, the second article will discuss the service level agreement, which formalizes the service plan with metrics appropriate to the real mission of the service.

Although it is important to involve users in determining these three models, it is absolutely critical for users to play a role in defining the service level agreement, since this is the basis for deciding what is to be delivered and what is to be deferred. Having the service’s users help make the decisions and understand why they resulted as they did goes a long way in developing the customer rapport to achieve the service’s longer-term goals.

Why Do I Need To Do This?
Ask 10 people what constitutes messaging management, and you’ll hear different answers. So what exactly do we mean here? Ultimately, we mean a cost-effective, balanced approach, where:

• the true value of the messaging service to the business is recognized, and
• the cost of the messaging service, including its management, is balanced against that true business value. In other words, good messaging management results in a recognized quality service that adds business value. There are many approaches to managing a messaging service, and the appropriate approaches for a given situation depend on many factors. The business environment in which our organizations operate is undergoing dramatic and radical changes. There is virtually no company that does not have an international customer or supplier. We are deeply immersed in the dynamics of a global economy:
• We no longer simply order and supply goods and services.
• Customers and suppliers now work in partnership.
• Suppliers are active participants in their customers’ business processes.
• Technology half-lives are typically only 6 months long, and still shrinking.
• Mergers, acquisitions, and divestitures are common to all.
• Business continues re-engineering.

Functional Model
Messaging management includes several management services, each of which involves several management functions. This section begins by describing the telephone network management model as a reference for the functionality to consider in managing a messaging service. This is followed by a discussion of the messaging management services and functions, including guidance for analyzing their rel-ative importance.

Ultimately, the importance of each function is determined by the degree to which the messaging service is critical to the corporate business processes. Thus, the prioritization of messaging management functions should be matched to the business dependency, both in dimension and in degree.

These conditions form the basis of the service model design that will be implemented. Once the service model is understood, decisions follow that define the actual management approach for successful implementation and continued operation.

Functional Model for Telephone Network Management
The Telephone Network Management (TNM: ITU-T M.3010) Model for MHS, reproduced in Table 1, is useful for modeling messaging management functions. With this model, one can see that manage-ment functions can be viewed from a variety of perspectives. It also provides a relatively comprehensive set of functions to compare against the local context.

At the lowest layer, management addresses individual messaging service elements. At the highest layer, management consists of the business activities, which drive the requirements on the lower layers.
The top layers of this model are applicable for managing any type of infrastructure service. Each cell of the model represents a component or aspect of the whole service that must be managed.
This model is oriented toward the ongoing management of the infrastructure service. Thus, as one comes to understand the role of these various functional components, it becomes straightforward to identify what different messaging management tools are needed and how they must work together. The following section addresses some of the ancillary functions that also need to be managed.

Model for Management of Messaging Services/Functions
Management can also be viewed as a laundry list of functions, categorized within types of services, including product management, implementation, production, operational, and customer support ser-vices. This model is intended to enhance the checklist of functionality originating from the TNM model.
This service model incorporates aspects needed for smooth implementation and maintenance of the messaging service. Table 2 illustrates the breadth of these services by identifying some of their functions. (No horizontal relationship is intended among the functions.)

• Product Management Product management is needed to adapt the messaging service to the dynamic requirements of the business. It also ensures that users have the appropriate awareness regarding the capabilities available through the service.
• Strategic Planning Strategic planning continually monitors technology and business trends to identify opportunities where the greatest synergy exists to the benefit of the company.
• Tactical Planning Tactical planning establishes the value and priority for implementing changes to the information infrastructure and/or how the company uses it.
• Service Promotion The greatest challenge for the management team is to internally promote the capabilities of the service. (Basically, it is the marketing arm of the service.)
• Messaging Library The messaging library is a resource for users and the service provision staff to learn how information infrastructures are leveraged in other places within the company, as well as in other companies. It also houses articles and information of interest regarding best practices from other operations that might be applied.
• Implementation Services Implementation services include those activities necessary to implement a new service or to implement changes to the current service.
• Test Center A test center validates the features and functions of products and services of interest. This is required to demonstrate that the components to be implemented will interoperate with the environment into which they will be installed.
• Name Space Management For a corporate-wide capability, all com-ponents, users, and customers must be consistently and uniquely identified so that they can be collaboratively managed. Name space management establishes the approach to naming these participants.
• Product Certification Product certification establishes that the proposed products to be implemented comply with all existing corporate standards, or identifies areas where new standards might need to be developed. This includes additional naming or addressing conventions.
• Consulting to Application Developers The value of the infrastructure comes from the applications that use it. Accordingly, it is incumbent on the implementation team for any service improvements or enhancements to ensure that application developers are aware of the changes and how they might take advantage of them. This allows quicker leveraging of the improvements and broader acceptance of change. 

• Component Acquisition and Rollout Actual implementation of new or improved services requires acquisition of new components, proper configurations, and delicate rollouts to ensure minimum disruption with maximum deployment. These are the responsibilities of the implementation team. This team should be comprised of users as well as technical staff, and can be supplemented with consultants experienced in such rollouts. 
  
• Production Services Production services are those activities necessary to ensure ongoing service access and quality. There is some overlap with the network management layer of the TNM model. 
  
• Address Book Management Directories in a messaging environment come in many forms. In addition to individual accounts, directory entries include distribution lists and group accounts. Having a consistent approach considerably facilitates directory synchronization. 
  
• Accounting Management Account management is responsible for allocating individual accounts and ensuring they are appropriately registered for billing. 
  
• Configuration Management Configuration management manages the list of components that make up the messaging service. It also manages the parameter settings for each component.
• Performance Management Performance management is responsible for monitoring the performance of the service and mapping it against the service level criteria established in the service definition.
• Security Management Security management is responsible for ensuring that accounts are appropriately used and accessed. They define best practices for securely managing the service and the information that passes through it. 
  
• Operational Services Operational services relate to those tasks that go on in the background to ensure the reliability of the service. 
  
• Backup/Recovery/Restore This function combines the activities of backing up files and logs for performing recoveries and restorations. The focus is to ensure the integrity of the service in the face of failures and disasters. 
  
• Archival Management Archival management differs from backup/recovery/restore in that it is oriented toward the long-term preservation of information in the form of messages. 
  
• Capacity Management Capacity management is responsible for ensuring sufficient resources (network bandwidth, storage, etc.) to maintain the service quality established
• Dynamic Monitoring Dynamic monitoring is the function of continual monitoring of queues and logs to ensure that message transfer occurs within the criteria established by service level agreements.
• Fault Detection Fault detection is the function that identifies the occurrence and nature of a system fault, so that repairs can be expeditiously achieved. 
  
• Customer Support Services Customer support services are those functions that provide direct service provider interactions with the end user. 
  
• User Training User training provides the end user with sufficient knowledge of the service to maximize its utility. 
  
• Problem Management Problem management records the occurrence of problems and tracks their resolution. It also includes the escalation procedures to expedite any unusual delays in resolution. 
  
• Message Tracking Message tracking audits the path taken by a message to ensure that delivery occurred, or to identify where a fault might have occurred en route. 
  
• Dead Letter Management As in the paper context, there are occasionally messages that do not get delivered or get hung up in a queue. This function is responsible for reviewing these messages to determine appropriate delivery or the reason for non-delivery.

Adapting to Local Context
Each of these services and functions must be addressed, at some level, in all messaging service environments. However, depending on the criticality of the messaging service to a given business environment, some functions will be more or less important. Table 3 shows a reference matrix for evaluating the relative importance of a management function against the significance that the service has in the environment. Those with low priority may sometimes not be implemented. However, as the significance increases, these areas should be implemented early to accommodate the rising expectations of the users.

Administrative Model
The administrative model of messaging management provides the procedural basis for operation of the messaging service and its interfaces to subscribers. To a large degree, the specifics are determined by the policies that govern the service environment. Accounting principles and privacy and security policies are the key aspects to consider.

• Cost Recovery “How should the service be priced and billed?” That is, is the service considered a general office utility like electricity, or is it a cost center that must allocate out by usage? This decision has considerable impact on usage patterns.
  
• Performance Measurement “How are service quality and performance measured and managed?” How is “uptime” measured on a store-and-forward system? If the critical metric is “no lost messages,” how can you know?
  
• System Security/Integrity “How are system security and integrity maintained?” Did the service meet the criteria of the security policies? Were they sufficient? “How are encryption keys managed?” What is the purpose of encryption in your context? Authentication keys should be handled differently than information encoding mechanisms.
  
• Audits “What types of audit trails should be kept?” Is there a need to keep the log files for all intermediate routers? What mechanisms are used to follow a trail?
  
• Archival “How long should message logs be archived?” Lawyers say they should be immediately deleted. Users would like to keep them indefinitely.
  
• Account Setup/Modification/ Deletion “How do these functions operate across technologies?” When e-mail, fax, and voice mail integrate into a “universal in-box,” what happens to the management functions and tools? “Should new accounts be automatically allocated to each new employee?” Should they be automatically generated by Human Resources?

Other Considerations
The administrative model must also consider the following cultural facets:

• “How is company awareness of the service raised?” Like any commercial service, there needs to be a marketing function to let users and potential users become aware of capabilities.
  
• Contract handling—What is the process for managing compliance to Service Level Agreements? Do they really matter?
  
• How computer literate is the user audience?
  —Is the audience principally novice or quite sophisticated? Does everyone have a home computer?
  —How large a populace is being served? How large is the extended environment
  (that is, the people outside the principal environment)?
  
• Is the organizational environment centrally focused, decentralized, or distributed? Infrastructures tend to reflect the organizational structure; however, wide-spread access to messaging tends to flatten an organization’s relationships.
  —How much autonomy is granted to subordinate units?
  —Where is the real power wielded?
  —What are the organizational dependencies?
  
  On this last point, it is suggested that a management jurisdiction model be developed (as described in the second article in this series), in order to facilitate full coordination and collaboration. This need not be an elaborate or formal document, but rather an organized recording of the approach, so that all involved have a common reference.