Change Management

Activate the Business Stakeholder plugin (com.snc.business_stakeholder) if you have an admin role. This plugin installs the Business Stakeholder role. Users with this role can view and approve records at all ITSM product levels.

Activate the Change Management - CAB Workbench plugin (com.snc.change_management.cab) with the admin role. It includes demo data and activates related plugins.

Activate the Change Management - Approval policy plugin (com.sn_chg_pol_appr) with the admin role. It includes demo data and activates related plugins.

Activate the Change Management - Change Model Foundation Data plugin (com.snc.change_management.change_model.foundation) with the admin role. It includes demo data and activates related plugins.

Activate the Change Management - Change Model Foundation Data plugin (com.snc.change_management.change_model.foundation) with the admin role. It includes demo data and activates related plugins.

Activate the Change Management - Risk Assessment plugin (com.snc.change_management.risk_assessment) with the admin role. It includes demo data and activates related plugins.

The Change Management - Risk Calculator plugin (com.snc.bestpractice.change_risk) is active by default in the base system. This plugin includes demo data and activates related plugins if they are not already active.

Activate the Change Management - Change Success Score plugin (com.snc.change_management.change_success_score) with the admin role. It activates related plugins.

Activate the Performance Analytics - Content Pack - Change Management (com.snc.pa.change) and Process Optimization (com.sn_process_optimization) plugins. It includes demo data and activates related plugins.

You can activate the Change Management - ATF Tests plugin (com.snc.change_management.atf) if you have the admin role. This plugin includes demo data and activates related plugins if they are not already active.

You can activate the Change Management - Change Schedule plugin (com.snc.change_management.soc) if you have the admin role. This plugin includes demo data and activates related plugins if they are not already active.

You can activate the Change Management - Data Archiving plugin (com.glide.auxdb) if you have the admin role. This plugin includes demo data and activates related plugins if they are not already active.

Prevent unauthorized access to change-related tables using deny-unless ACLs by activating the ITSM Enhanced Security Features (com.snc.itsm.enhanced_security) plugin.

Assign a change model attribute to a state in a change model so that scripts can check for the attribute when a change request is in that state.

You can add an agenda item to your CAB meeting to customize the agenda and make the meeting more effective.

Create related definitions to present related tasks for change requests in the change schedule. For example, define a related definition to view the change tasks associated with a change request.

Use e-signatures to add an additional layer of verification and compliance to change approval workflows. e-signatures are supported in both Core UI and Service Operations Workspace (SOW).

Assign an ITIL change process to a change model so the ChangeRequest API uses that model when it creates a matching change request.

Attach files, such as documents, spreadsheets, and images, to a standard change proposal. Standard change templates copy any file attached to the template to a change request that the template creates.

You can attach a process with defined conditions to the change model states to enable state transitions.

Users with the itil role can attend Change Advisory Board (CAB) meetings from the CAB Workbench to follow the current agenda item and view the change schedule. Approvers can also approve or reject change requests.

Mass Update CI enables you to apply the same update to a set of configuration items (CIs) in a specific CI class. Use Mass Update CI on instances where the Change Management - State Model plugin is active.

You can associate additional CIs or services with change requests through related lists on the Change Request form. You can also associate CIs with a change request from the dependency views map.

Change Management offers a state model to move and track change requests through several states.

Conflict detection identifies potential scheduling conflicts for a change request based on the configuration items, and planned start and end date or the change. If a scheduling conflict exists, conflict detection also checks any related blackout or maintenance schedules and other active change requests to determine the scheduling conflict.

The ServiceNow Change Management application provides a systematic approach to control the life cycle of all changes. Use it to make beneficial changes with minimum disruption to IT services.

Change Management provides two methods to calculate the risk of a change. The Change Management - Risk Calculator plugin is active by default in the base system, and Change Management - Risk Assessment is optional.

Standard changes are pre-approved, low risk changes with a proven history of success. The standard change catalog contains the changes that have been approved by the Change Management application as standard changes.

The Change Advisory Board (CAB) Workbench enables CAB managers to schedule, plan, and manage CAB meetings.

The Change Management integration with Hardware Asset Management helps determine the asset action that must be performed on the configuration item (CI) that is associated with a hardware asset. Using this capability, change implementers can update asset records directly from change and asset managers can see the current state of all assets that were updated by the change request.

This workbench dashboard enables you to view and assess all open changes separated into age brackets: less than one day, from 1-5 days, from 6-30 days, from 31-90 days, and over 90 days.

The Change Approval Policy workflow activity controls the approval process for a change request. It creates user and group approvals according to a change approval policy record. A workflow can include multiple activities, each referencing the same or different Change Approval Policies.

Create a change approval policy in Decision Builder to define the approvals that are generated for your change requests.

Change approval policies use approval definitions to generate approvals according to your business requirements.

The conflict calendar graphically represents the potential scheduling conflicts for a change request. Conflicts are identified as active change requests, blackout schedules, and changes scheduled outside maintenance schedules. Use the Scheduling Assistant to resolve any schedule conflicts.

Platform Analytics Solutions and in-form analytics contain preconfigured dashboards. These dashboards contain actionable data visualizations that help you improve your business processes and practices.

The enhanced Change data model supports better categorization, change model linkage, and role-based access to change templates. This new data model does not impact the existing standard change catalog and no migration of existing standard changes is required.

Use Workflow Studio actions as building blocks to handle the change models and types. The flow actions are available under the ITSM spoke in Workflow Studio.

Change Management change flows provide a library of reusable actions and end-to-end implementations of the change models in the base system.

These states describe where a change lockdown sits in its approval cycle, which actions are available, and whether the lockdown holds any change requests.

Change lockdown allows change managers to pause all or a subset of in-flight change requests. Use it during major unplanned IT, critical, or financial events.

Use this dashboard to see the trends in change request resolution over time across different change request risks, ages, and priorities. Break down change requests over time according to the assignment groups you manage.

If your organization is subscribed to ITOM Discovery or ITOM Visibility, integration with these ITOM products is automatically enabled. With this integration, any configuration item (CI) with an IP address that is part of a change request process can be maintained automatically. Change request fulfillers can also manually request the discovery process for a CI.

The Change Management integration with Software Asset Management (SAM) displays the projected licensing cost implication of a change.

You can integrate Change Management with other ServiceNow applications such as Discovery, Software Asset Management, and Hardware Asset Management.

The Predictive Intelligence for Change Management capability uses machine-learning algorithms to suggest standard templates, identify similar incidents, and enhance risk assessment for the change.

Administrators can configure the Change Management Intelligent solutions system properties to use Predictive Intelligence capabilities.

Use these server-side and client-side methods to check which change model attributes are present for a change request in its current state.

Change model attributes are tags that you assign to states in a change model. Scripts can check which attributes are present in the current state of a change and turn functionality on or off for that state.

Configure the Change Models properties to access the Change models capabilities when creating a Change request.

Use this dashboard to get an overview of the current status of open reports.

You can activate one or more of the Change Management plugins if they are not already active. Some plugins include demo data.

This dashboard uses Workbench widgets and other advanced Platform Analytics features to give you all the information about the Change process in one place.

Change Management features provide ways to calculate and assess the risk of change requests, and to identify and resolve conflicts.

After you create a change request, you can assess and analyze the risk and impact involved in the change request. You can review any conflicts that are detected by reviewing the change request.

The Change Schedules landing page provides a view of schedules that are categorized under Pinned Schedules, Your Schedules, and All Schedules. The grouping of schedules provides easy access to your most required schedules and saves your time from searching through all the schedules in the system.

The Change Schedules module provides a Gantt or timeline view of change requests based on criteria defined within a Change Schedule Definition.

To calculate the success score, formula indicators are provided. These indicators apply the multiplication operation to the data collected by the automated indicators to arrive at the final score.

This workbench dashboard enables you to view and assess all open changes separated into status brackets: New, Assessed, Authorized, Scheduled, Implemented, and Reviewed.

Change Success score contains Performance Analytics indicators for data collection. Indicators define a performance measurement taken at regular intervals of a business service, an activity, or organizational behavior. These performance measurements result in a series of indicator scores over time.

Configure the score ranges, colors, and text that the Change Success Score card displays for each success score rating.

Use team historical data for insights into team performance. The score value helps you determine how likely the team is to complete your change request without issues.

Change template management flows trigger and manage steps for the template proposal, modification, and retirement processes.

Standardize the creation of change requests by creating change templates based on all available change models.

Change Management supports the three types of service changes ITIL describes — standard, emergency, and normal. The change type determines which state model is invoked and the change process that must be followed.

Use this dashboard to track the average duration of change requests in the last 30 days.

Compliance dynamic schema stores the risk and compliance details of a change as name and value pairs in a single field. This avoids adding a column to the Change Request table for each detail.

You can configure various aspects of Change Management based on the specific requirements of your organization.

Configure states for change models and define transition between multiple states.

Review and adjust the dynamic namespace that supports the risk and compliance fields on a change request. Ensure the attributes and categories match the compliance obligations of your organization.

Detect change conflicts by setting Change Management conflict analysis properties. Use the resulting information to calculate conflicts for change requests and review and modify the change to eliminate conflicts.

You can configure the ability to copy a change request record and its details using system properties.

Configure the Risk Intelligence properties to control how the Predictive Intelligence solution predicts the risk of a change request and how the predicted risk is used.

Access Mobile Agent on your mobile device to manage your change tasks.

Use the table-based configuration to align the Service Operations Workspace Dynamic Overview Pages with the change process of your organization.

Modify the change request state change notification to specify when it's sent, who receives it, and what it contains. When active, the notification is sent when the state changes to Scheduled, Implement, Review, or Canceled.

Create template categories and child categories to classify templates based on a change model, template usage, and requirements.

Maintenance schedules define the periods during which a configuration item (CI) or change can be implemented.

You can copy details of an active or canceled change request to a new change request.

Create an individual Change Advisory Board (CAB) meeting occurrence.

Create change models to configure the states and transitions to match your organization's change processes.

Create a template for change requests with predefined supporting tasks. Templates simplify the process of submitting new records by populating fields automatically.

Create change tasks to track the work for a change request, such as planning, implementing, testing, and reviewing the change.

Configure a Child change model to define the states required by the Child change requests.

Configure a Primary change model so that a change using this model generates one Child change for each affected configuration item (CI).

Create a flow to configure child change creation on the primary change model. The flow triggers when the primary change reaches the configured state.

You can create a change task template to add to a standard change proposal. If the standard change proposal is approved, the related change tasks are created when the standard change request is created.

Use approval definitions to define a set of criteria that are evaluated automatically before the policy is marked as approved.

Create a change lockdown to pause in-flight change requests during major unplanned IT, critical, or financial events.

Create a custom change model attribute that you can assign to states in a change model and check in scripts to control behavior for each state.

Use a change approval policy to define the approvals that are generated for your change requests.

Create, customize, and then propose a change template for any change model to standardize common change requests so that users don't have to create them manually.

You can define a change schedule from a change schedule definition record. Change schedule definitions help you to define the content that displays in the change summary popover, the users, groups, or roles to share a schedule with, and related span style colors.

You can create a change schedule to view all scheduled changes, change tasks, blackout periods, and maintenance windows for any given date, week, month, or year.

Decision records contain the conditions that you can use to determine the change approval action. Create decisions with the condition builder when you create change approval policies.

Create an information schedule to record events such as holidays or organizational events that change teams should be aware of. Conflict detection doesn't create conflict records for information schedules.

Policy inputs are variable sources that you can use while evaluating a decision to determine the approval action. You can create multiple policy inputs to evaluate the decision created, and also access the change request table and any table change request references.

Create predefined transition conditions to reuse the conditions for your change models.

Create a user criteria record and add it to a change model to control which users can view and use that change model.

Use the Change Management troubleshooting properties and change the value of the properties to get additional logging details for the feature.

Define style rules from a change schedule definition to apply them to the change schedule that's related to the definition.

Define style rules from the Default Style Rules module to apply them to all change schedules rather than to a specific application.

The Change Management - Change Model Foundation Data plugin (com.snc.change_management.change_model.foundation) includes state field policies for the base system change models. All default policies make fields mandatory only.

Define the risk calculation rules that determine the risk and impact of a change. The Change Management - Change Risk Calculator plugin is active by default in the base system.

Make change request fields mandatory or read-only in a specific state of a change model by adding state field policies to the model state.

Create style rules from the change schedules view to apply them to the specific change schedule where they're defined.

A Change Advisory Board (CAB) definition is similar to a recurring meeting invitation. When you define a CAB definition, it determines the attributes that are associated with all CAB meetings generated from that definition.

You can choose to disable the generation of unauthorized change requests that you receive on any unauthorized change event. When a configuration item (CI) that is part of an application service is updated, the system identifies this update and verifies whether the updated CI is part of an open change request.

Change Management supports domain separation. Domain separation enables you to separate data, processes, and administrative tasks into logical groupings called domains. You can control several aspects of this separation, including which users can see and access data.

The Change Management processes for a change request are controlled by workflows defined for a specific change request type.

Help prevent unauthorized access to change-related tables using deny-unless ACLs. A deny-unless authentication ACL restricts access for a non-authenticated user.

Access Mobile Agent on your mobile device to manage change tasks.

Learn about the terms and concepts used in Change Management.

You can activate the Change Management - Success Probability plugin (com.snc.change_management.success_probability) if you have the admin role.

Several types of components are installed with the Change Management - Change Schedule.

Several types of components are installed with activation of the Change Management - Approval Policy plugin, including tables.

The Business Stakeholder plugin (com.snc.business_stakeholder) installs the Business Stakeholder role when activated.

Several types of components are installed with the Change Management- Risk Calculator.

Several types of components are installed with activation of the Change Management - Change Success Score (com.snc.change_management.change_success_score) plugin, including tables and scheduled jobs.

Several user roles are installed with the activation of the ITSM Roles - Change Management plugin (com.snc.itsm.roles.change_management). Security ACLs to support the security model for Change Management and related functionality are also installed.

Several types of components are installed with activation of the Change Management - Risk Intelligence plugin, including tables.

Several components are installed with the Major Change (com.sn_major_change) plugin. These include system properties and a data retention rule for Child changes.

Several types of components are installed with activation of the Change Management - Standard Change Template Intelligence plugin, including tables.

Several types of components are installed with activation of the Change Management - Predictive Intelligence Core plugin, including tables. These tables can be used only after the other Change Management Predictive Intelligence plugins are activated.

Several types of components are installed with the Change Management - CAB Workbench plugin.

The change model specifies which ITIL change process it represents: Normal, Standard, or Emergency. The change is still governed by the model.

For ITSM, specifically incident and change, identifying the location of critical data can help reduce mean time to resolve incidents and eliminate outages caused by change.

Change Management lets you control every aspect of the IT change process from creation to approval. When you have accurate information, you can minimize risks to your business and avoid conflicts with scheduling. This product view helps you understand how Change Management key entities work with the core CSDM framework.

Consider these points while implementing the CSDM framework.

Change Management manages and uses CSDM tables. Several ServiceNow products benefit from and add value to Change Management.

Users can migrate legacy change risk assessments to versions compatible with the new Change Risk Assessment table schema and logic.

Use the Allow Conflict Detection attribute to limit conflict detection to a specific change model state. Conflict detection then runs only when a change request reaches that state.

Conflict detection checks change requests against active lockdown records in the same run that checks maintenance windows and blackout windows. A change request that falls inside a lockdown period is reported as a conflict and automatically placed on hold.

As a Change Advisory Board (CAB) manager, you can view and manage details of a CAB meeting and its agenda items through the CAB Workbench.

Manage a change lockdown by previewing affected change requests, submitting for approval, reverting to draft, or canceling it.

Change models help streamline change requests by tailoring a fit-for-purpose process to support specific, common change use cases.

Modify or retire standard change templates to meet your organization's requirements.

Activate Change Management core and update your change types and customizations when you upgrade an instance that used Change Management before the Geneva release.

When you migrate a change risk assessment, the system maps records from legacy risk assessment to the new risk assessment tables.

Add comments to a change task from the Mobile Agent mobile application. For example, to add an insight about the change task or a discussion regarding the change task.

Manage your change tasks from anywhere using the Mobile Agent mobile application. With this mobile application, you can stay connected and access the information in real time to complete your tasks.

When you implement the change task, you can close the task from the Mobile Agent mobile application.

View the state, risk, and schedule of change tasks in the Mobile Agent mobile application.

This role grants write access to the scripted condition fields on model state transition conditions and model condition types.

Copy and modify change templates.

Modify the multiplier values in the formula indicators to calculate the final success score.

Configure a change request to detect conflicts outside the maintenance window. Conflict detection flags planned start and end dates that fall outside the maintenance schedule, so you can modify the change schedule accordingly.

Each change request model progresses through a number of state values in a specific order.

Use the ITSM change management agentic workflows to manage and complete tasks autonomously.

Propose a new standard change template when you identify a need while creating a change request.

Administrators can use change properties to configure Change Management behavior.

The Change Management - Change Risk Calculator plugin enables dynamic calculations of the risk and impact of a change. The administrator specifies how and when risk and impact rules are applied.

Several types of components are installed with the Change Management - Mass update CI.

Several types of components are installed with the Change Management - State Model.

Several types of components are installed with the Change Management - Core.

Several types of components are installed with Change Management - Collision Detector.

Several types of components are installed with Change Management - Standard Change Catalog.

Reference sections provide additional information about components installed with Change Management.

Modify the agenda items for a specific Change Advisory Board (CAB) meeting.

The Impacted services and CIs related list refreshes its records based on the affected CIs. Records in the Service Offerings and Business Applications related lists also refresh. Use this information to identify impacted services and CIs and take action.

Use the refresh impacted services properties to turn on or turn off the refresh impacted services capability, and to configure the criteria for additional refresh impacted services properties.

The Change Management - Predictive Intelligence Core plugin (com.snc.change_management.ml) activates predictive intelligence features for Change Management. It installs automatically with other Change Management Predictive Intelligence plugins requested through the Now Support Customer Service system.

To activate the Change Management capability to predict change risk using Predictive Intelligence, request the Change Management - Risk Intelligence plugin (com.snc.change_management.ml.risk) through the Now Support Customer Service system.

The Change Management - Standard Change Template Intelligence plugin (com.snc.change_management.ml.sctp) uses Predictive Intelligence to identify change clusters and propose standard change templates. Request the plugin through the Now Support Customer Service system.

Request the ITSM Roles plugin (com.snc.itsm.roles) to activate the ITSM Roles - Change Management plugin (com.snc.itsm.roles.change_management). This gives change agents, technicians, and managers more control over access within your Change Management process.

Retire change templates that you no longer need.

Review a change template proposed for common change requests.

Risk lookup table is to get the risk value corresponding to the success probability value and impact value.

Scaled Change extends change management to complex environments with many configuration items. A single Scaled Change generates and coordinates child change records for every affected configuration item. It uses scheduling intelligence, conflict detection, and approval workflows to keep large-scale changes on track from planning through closure.

Maintenance, blackout, and information schedules each have their own set of categories that describe the purpose of the schedule.

Conflict detection uses maintenance, blackout, and information schedules to evaluate when change requests can be implemented. Each schedule type supports a category and optional ownership fields.

Send Change Advisory Board (CAB) meeting invitations to the attendees of each CAB meeting.

Change the maximum number of records that a change lockdown preview displays. This keeps the preview readable on instances with a large volume of change requests.

Use state field policies to make change request fields mandatory or read-only at each state in a change model. Policies are enforced on the form when a change request is created or updated.

If you upgraded from a release prior to Geneva, you must update old state labels to new state labels after you activate the Change Management state model.

You can create a style span to specify the color for different events in a change schedule. Style spans in a schedule help to quickly identify characteristics of a change based on a field value from the Change Request.

Success Probability definition is a configuration that defines the probability and the matching conditions of a change request.

You can activate the Change Management - Mass Update CI plugin (com.snc.change_management.mass_update_ci) if you have the admin role. This plugin includes demo data and activates related plugins if they are not already active.

You can activate the Change Management - Core plugin (com.snc.change_management) if you have the admin role. This plugin includes demo data and activates related plugins if they are not already active.

You can activate the Change Management - Collision Detector plugin (com.snc.change.collision) if you have the admin role. This plugin includes demo data and activates related plugins if they are not already active.

You can activate the Change Management - Standard Change Catalog plugin (com.snc.change_management.standard_change_catalog) if you have the admin role. This plugin includes demo data and activates related plugins if they are not already active.

You can activate the Change Management - State Model plugin (com.snc.change_management.state_model) if you have the admin role. This plugin includes demo data and activates related plugins if they are not already active.

Add a state to the state model for different change types to meet the requirements of your organization.

You can add a new change type to your change process. There are several processes involved with adding a change type. These processes include managing script includes and workflows.

Add a Complete state between the Implement and Review states as an example of extending the state model.

Add a UI policy to display the Needs review field for Normal change requests when it reaches the Complete state.

Perform a risk assessment on an existing change request after the risk assessment criteria are defined, and view the responses on the change request.

Use script includes or UI policies to configure state models and the criteria for moving change requests from one state to another.

Configure the standard change catalog through the standard change properties.

Create a change request to implement a controlled process for modifying approved and supported configuration items (CIs).

Create a change request from a list of configuration items (CIs), or add selected CIs from a list to a change record.

Use the Blackout and Maintenance windows to schedule a change. Blackout windows specify times during which normal change activity should not be scheduled. Maintenance windows specify times during which change requests should be scheduled. For example, create a blackout schedule for code freezes at the end of the year.

Create a custom choice field to indicate whether a change request must go through the Review state.

Create an access control rule (ACL) to avoid the Needs review field from being modified after it has been set.

Create a new choice for the change request state.

Create and add a process flow record for the Complete state. The process flow formatter displays at the top of the Change Request form.

Create a UI action to display a button on a change request for the Complete state.

Define assignment rules to assign change requests automatically to the appropriate group or individual.

Define the risk assessment questions, thresholds, and conditions that calculate the risk of a change request from information that the end user provides.

The ability to associate multiple CIs to a task can be extended to other types of tasks. You can also disable multiple CI association from the related lists on change request records.

You can put a change request on hold to get additional information for the created change request.

You can approve, implement, review, and close a change request.

You can create a standard change request from the published standard change catalog templates.

Automate conflict detection to run at specific intervals or when a change request is updated to immediately review the conflicts when the schedule dates are updated.

Run conflict detection manually for a change request. Review the conflicts detected either automatically or manually and resolve them by changing the schedules.

Update the ChangeRequestStateHandler script include with the new Complete state.

Update the ChangeRequestStateModel_normal script include to add new functions for the Complete state.

Update the change request workflow to reflect the addition of the Complete state.

Create Risk categorization or similarity solution definitions to use the predictive intelligence that helps in accessing change risk.

Train the Standard change proposal solution definition to use clustering capabilities to identify and suggest Standard Change templates to create a change.

Use the Unauthorized Change Properties page to turn on or turn off the unauthorized change capability, and to configure the criteria for additional unauthorized change properties.

Understand how an unauthorized change activity on a configuration item (CI) is captured and managed, so that you can review and take timely action on this change.

Apply your change approval policy in the Change Management Workflow Studio action to control the approval process for a change request. You can create user and group approvals according to a change approval policy record.

You can use the proposed changes in a change request to apply the same update to a set of CIs for a specific CI class.

Apply your Change Policy in your Change Request workflow to manage the approvals.

Prevent schedule conflicts by using the conflict calendar to manage your change schedule details, customize views, and resolve conflicts.

You can review and determine the conflicts in a change schedule by assigning the maintenance schedules to configuration items (CI). After you assign a maintenance schedules to the CI, add the CI to the change request.

Use the CAB Workbench to review and authorize change requests and review recently implemented changes.

Use the change approval policy to create change approval definitions and the change approval policy workflow to control the approval process for a change request.

Work on change requests and create the approval policies as required to meet your organizational needs.

You can view the details of any past, scheduled, or in-progress CAB meeting.

The CAB calendar provides an overview of your CAB meeting schedule to help with planning and managing CAB meetings.