Changes are inevitable in an organization. It’s extremely critical to plan changes effectively to reduce their impact on the organization.


Freshservice provides a change management module that allows you to effectively streamline your cha

nge activities. The module also enables you to associate incidents and problems with a change request and coordinate CAB approvals.



Planning details


You can specify the Reason and Impact analysis to Changes in your service desk. This can be useful when you want to keep your analysis documented and shared with everybody in your team who wants to have a look.


Once you have decided to go ahead with your change, it is important that you get your agenda in order by coming up with a Rollout plan. Similarly, a Backout plan is critical for restoring services back to normal when things don’t go right.


Adding Planning Details:

  1. Open the Change Module by clicking on the Changes icon from the left pane.

  2. Click on a Change to view the details.

  3. Under Planning, you can use the Reason, Impact, Rollout Plan, and Backout Plan Fields to fill in the Planning details. You can add information, insert images and links, and also attach files to supplement your report.

  4. Once you’re done adding the relevant information, click on Add to save the changes.



You can also change the name of the fields used to record Planing Details according to your organizational needs. To do so:

  1. Navigate to Admin > Service management > Service Desk settings 
    If your account has more than one workspace: 

    To modify global workflows, navigate to Admin > Global Settings >  Service management > Service Desk settings

    To modify workspace-level workflows, navigate to Admin > Workspace Settings > {Workspace Name} >  Service management > Service Desk settings.

  2. Scroll down to find the Planning Fields. Hover over the fields and click on the pencil icon to edit the fields.


  1. Click on the pencil icon, to add help text and placeholder text to the change form fields. Help text and placeholder text can be used to add extra context for the users. The placeholder text is displayed within the field and the help text is below the fields. 

For example, you can help users understand the change types in the following scenario using Help text and Placeholder text. 


     4. Once done with your changes, click on Save.


Approvals

Once you have laid out plans for your change, you can submit it to one of the CABs in your service desk. This will help your Change Manager in deciding whether or not to go ahead with the change. 

You can click on the +Request for CAB Approval button under approvals to select the Cab members or groups to send out approvals to. To know more about Change approvals click here.


 

Once you have submitted your change for approval, you will have to wait for a while before the CAB votes on it. The Change Manager will have the final word on whether the change is approved.


 The following actions can be performed within a Change:


  • You can view the Change Lifecycle Status on the top bar. 

  • You can add notes and tasks to the change. 

  • You can add and view the associated incidents, problems, and assets.

  • The activities tab gives a complete overview of all the events associated with the change.

  • You can associate a release or a project from the associate menu on the top right corner.

  • You can update the Change Type, Priority, Impact, Risk, and Date fields under the Change Properties section in the sidebar.




FAQs


1. Where can I edit the change lifecycle status?

The change lifecycle can be modified based on the change type. To edit and customize it, navigate to Admin > Service Management > Change lifecycle, you can learn more about this in here.



2. How do I modify the email template for change approvals?

It can be modified under Admin > Email notifications > Changes > Notify CAB Member.


3. I am unable to mandate or edit the Change Planning field, how to resolve this?


You will be able to edit the Planning fields from the Global Settings Admin > Field Manager >Change Fields >  Planning.

Please note that we don't have the option to make them mandatory in the field manager module, but you can achieve this using the "Business rules module for changes."


4. Why am I unable to close the change request?


Directly closing the change status isn't possible. Instead, the status must be transitioned from one state to another according to the change lifecycle configuration in Admin > Change Lifecycle.