The comprehensive international standard for Software Asset Management aligned to service management (sometimes referred to as the Information Technology Infrastructure Library, or ITIL) is ISO/IEC 19770-1:2006 SAM Processes. This vendor-independent standard is supported by much of the IT industry, including Microsoft.
This standard can potentially benefit your organization by:
Providing the ability to easily establish a gap analysis between current practices and baseline best practices. This enables organizations to identify opportunities for quick wins and longer-term improvements.
Presenting an independent and comprehensive framework for SAM that is aligned to service management, and specifically to ISO/IEC 20000 and the ITIL framework. With this framework in place, organizations can be confident that work done will align to corporate governance and industry best-practice developments.
Making available new tools and methodologies that will be developed by the IT industry based on ISO/IEC 19770-1, such as risk assessments and implementation methodologies.
Providing the ability to demonstrate good corporate governance in a highly complex area of IT. ISO/IEC 19770-1 is driven by corporate governance from the top down, and it helps provide substance for the idea of corporate governance, a term that is much used but often not well understood.
