Managing job plans
You use job plans to structure the scheduled series of implementation tasks that are performed during a Change implementation phase. Conceptually, a job plan is a process template for the Change process. This template contains several different specifications that help structure and manage a Change. Job plans are focused on tasks, with Change assessors and approvers listed separately.
Separating assessments and approvals from the linear, step-by-step flow of implementation tasks allows for a more flexible way to route the Change during the assessment and authorization phases. Typically, the workflow that you assign to a Change manages the routing of these notifications. The workflow starts the step-by-step implementation tasks that are listed in the job plan only after the assessment, authorization, and scheduling phases are completed.
Change job plans are assigned the Change work order class (WO class). The work order class is specified in the Default WO Class field in the job plan. All job plans that belong to this class contain the Change Assessments, Change Authorization, and Change Template tabs. These tabs are not displayed for job plans that belong to other work order classes.
This product ships with a set of built-in job plans that can be used for an extensive variety of Changes. For a list of these built-in job plans, see the "Job plans" topic in the Content section. To examine these built-in job plans, open the Job Plans application (), type PMCHG in the Job Plan field, and press Enter. You can select any of the job plans to view details about that plan. You can modify these built-in plans, and you can create your own plans. See the online help in the Job Plans application for instructions.
A job plan captures the following important information for processing Changes:
| Information captured in job plan | Description |
|---|---|
| Change type | Job plans are associated with the normal, standard, or emergency type. For example, the built-in job plan used for emergency changes is associated with the emergency type. The Type field is located in the Change Template, Change Assessments, and Change Authorization tabs. The Change type that is contained in a job plan is automatically brought into a Change when the job plan is applied to the Change. |
| List of assessors | The assessments that are needed, and the owners or owner groups to which the assessments will be assigned, are listed in the Change Assessments tab. When a job plan is assigned to a Change, the assessment records in the job plan are automatically brought into the Change. You can add additional assessors in the Assessments tab of the Changes application. |
| List of approvers | Needed approvals and their associated approvers are listed in the Change Authorization tab. When a job plan is assigned to a Change, the authorization records in the job plan are automatically brought into the Change. You can add additional approvals in the Authorization tab of the Changes application. |
| Failure probability | Each job plan is associated with a failure probability, based on the frequency of this type of Change, the business impact of target CI outages, and so on. The failure probability value is indicated in the Failure Probability field in the Change Assessments tab. The failure probability provided by a job plan is brought into a Change when the job plan is applied. |
| Fully automated indicator | A fully automated Change is one that occurs without human intervention. The built-in Standard Automated Job Plan is used for fully automated Changes. The Fully Automated check box is located in the Change Template tab and is applied to any Change to which the job plan is applied. The built-in Standard Automated JobPlan (PMCHGSTANA) provides an example of setting the Fully Automated value. |
| Implementation tasks | Each job plan contains a list of implementation tasks that will be completed in a Change to which the plan is applied. The list of implementation tasks is contained in the Job Plan Tasks table of the Job Plan tab; this list of tasks is brought into any Change that uses this job plan. |
You can manually assign a job plan to a Change. More commonly, the workflow runs an action to cause the appropriate response plan to be selected; the response plan then locates the correct job plan for the Change. When a job plan is applied to a Change, the Change is automatically populated with the tasks, assessments, approvals, and other information contained in the job plan. You can modify any of these items within a Change without changing the job plan; you can add implementation tasks, add or remove assessment or approval assignments, and so on. For example, you might want to add additional approvers for the authorization phase, based on your assessment results.