1. Introduction

A convergence of a series of technologies and tendencies, such as high-speed Internet, web services, and service oriented architecture (SOA), has given rise to a new category of software developers with a radically different business model: web services providers. Web services are accessible via the Internet through open standards and service oriented architectures. Service providers design applications that can function as technology-independent reusable services, and the success of their businesses depends on services quality and satisfying customer expectations. Effective service management is itself a strategic asset of service providers, providing them with the ability to carry out their core business of providing services that deliver value to customers by facilitating the outcomes customers want to achieve.

There are different standards and reference process models that propose best practices for IT Services Management (ITSM) such as Information Technology Infrastructure Library (ITIL), ISO/IEC 20000 International Standard, and Capability Maturity Model Integration for Services (CMMI-SVC), among others. ITIL is one of the process models used currently most often by organizations. Empirical works demonstrate the operational and strategic benefits obtained by companies that implement ITIL.

ITSM frameworks provide important benefits but their implementation in organizations is a complex process and managers have to make very important and difficult decisions. Due to the complexity and uncertainty in decision-making situations in this field, model-driven Decision Support Systems (DSS) help managers make better decisions. A model-driven DSS emphasizes access to and manipulation of quantitative models to support decision-making process. Simulation models are an important type of quantitative model used in model-driven DSS. A simulation model can imitate the behavior of a system. It enables managers to modify model input parameters to examine the model outputs sensitivity and to realize analysis "what if". It can capture underlying mechanism and dynamics of a system, which enables decision managers to effectively manage daily operations and make long term plans. It provides also a test-bed to asses changes in operations and managerial policies. Power and Sharda present an overview of the research performed in the context of model-driven DSS. They show the applicability and utility of simulation-driven DSS to support decision making in different scopes.

The aim of this study is to analyze the use and applications of simulation modeling to help decision making in IT service strategy. We address the following two research questions.

(i) Q1: Is simulation modeling used to make decisions in IT service strategy?

(ii) Q2: Is it adequate to use System Dynamics to solve IT service strategy problems?


The main contributions of this work that answer the research questions mentioned above are as follows:

(i) a study of the published papers that use simulation modeling to support decision making in IT service strategy scope. According to their application fields, the papers have been associated with the most suitable process of the ITIL Service Strategy module.

(ii) System Dynamics that help evaluate the fulfillment of strategic goals for IT service providers and make decisions in the context of strategy management.


The rest of the paper is structured as follows. Next section presents general issues of simulation modeling and shows an overview of the works that apply simulation in the context of ITIL service strategy module. Section 3 includes the description of the problem that our simulation model aims to resolve. Section 4 describes our simulation model and explains some of the experiments performed to illustrate its use and applications. Finally, Section 5 summarizes this paper and presents our conclusions.