FAQs

The overall goal of the multi-year IT Asset Management (ITAM) Program is to create an accurate and complete centralized IT asset inventory in ServiceNow. ​

IT Asset Management (ITAM) is a set of business practices that incorporates IT assets across the business units within the organization. It joins the financial, inventory, contractual and risk management responsibilities to manage the overall life cycle of these assets including tactical and strategic decision making.

A centralized, consolidated IT Asset inventory benefits WashU in multiple ways including (but not limited to):

• Improve Security & Risk Management​
• By decreasing the amount of unknown and unmanaged assets in our environment we can reduce security risks​
• Help ensure compliance with security standards and controls based on business needs​
• Improve security incident detection and response time​
• Improve Financial Management​
• By Improving software license tracking to ensure compliance​ and also providing analytics and reporting to support such functions as the end user computer replacement cycle which can help departments budget more efficiently ​
• Improve Customer Service and Support​
• Through enabling faster end user incident and service response
• Improving service availability with proactive lifecycle management

CI (Configuration Item) Owners and/or Asset Managers will be responsible for updating/maintaining asset information in ServiceNow.

The first phase of ITAM focuses on Hardware and will include such types as End User Computers, Servers and Network Devices. Future phases will bring in additional types of Hardware and incorporate Software.

The specific attributes vary by asset type, but are commonly grouped under the categories of Inventory (including serial number and asset tag), Configuration (tangible information the asset can tell us about itself, such as CPU type), Assignment & Ownership, Financial, Contracts (including warranty types and dates), and Status (including location, life cycle status, and planned retirement date). The Program will be publishing a list of all tracked attributes with their descriptions.

The asset inventory will be stored in ServiceNow. You will need ServiceNow ITIL user access in order to view reports. You will need specific access (to be determined) in order to edit asset information.

Information on reporting on IT Assets out of ServiceNow will be available in early summer 2023.

Please reach out to the Program Team at ITasset@wustl.edu

Capitalized assets that are IT assets are in scope for IT Asset Management. Keep in mind that some IT assets are capitalized assets, but not all capitalized assets are IT assets —  they mean different things. Capitalized assets are physical property that are tracked by Property Accounting. According to Property Accounting, “Assets purchased are deemed Capital if the original single unit acquisition cost is greater than $5,000 and the item has a useful life greater than 2 years.” This means that some IT assets (such as servers) may be considered a capitalized asset and are subject to tracking by Property Accounting in addition to tracking under IT Asset Management.

IT Assets are brought into Service now in a variety of ways:

• Service Now Discovery, which runs on a continuous rotating schedule
• Integrations with tools such as MECM, JAMF, HIPPO, and CMS
• Through manual input

The IT Asset Management Program includes is all IT assets at WashU, not just those purchased by WashU IT. The current project phase of the Program, Hardware Asset Management Phase 1, is for servers (including virtual) and end user computers (laptops and desktops).

The IT Asset Management Program will be integrating the new WUSM Medical Internet Of Things (MIOT) solution, Ordr, with ServiceNow Asset Management to bring medical devices into inventory. This project is starting in late summer 2023 and more information will be available on what is in scope for this project in early fall 2023.

In general, if WashU IT staff normally takes care of asset maintenance for you now, that will continue. You will only be responsible for providing WashU IT with information about your assets (ex: when an computer is given to a new staff member after someone leaves or if you purchase a computer outside of the normal acquisition process).

Someone will need to provide WashU IT with the information about these devices upon purchase to ensure they get added into ServiceNow. We will be asking for information about devices, both those managed by WashU IT and those not, in order to have complete information about the assets.

Establishing and maintain a complete and accurate IT asset inventory has several tangible benefits including, but not limited to:

• Providing organizational areas with the information needed to forecast budget needs for IT assets

• Creating a more secure environment and reduce overall risk by having information about asset ownership and contact information to respond to vulnerabilities

Information on the roles within ServiceNow, and the capabilities of these roles has been published on Confluence. This document will continue to be updated as additional roles/functionality is added.