Sample questions of ITIL V4-Four Dimensions of Service Management

1.Which service management dimension is focused on the communication systems and knowledge bases used by employees?

A) Organizations and people

B) Information and technology

C) Partners and suppliers

D) Value streams and processes


Answer: B

            The information and technology dimension focuses on the information and knowledge necessary for the management of services,as well as the technologies required.


2.Which service management dimension is focused on the roles and responsibilities of the people involved in a process workflow?


A) Organizations and people

B) Information and technology

C) Partners and suppliers

D) Value streams and processes


Answer: A

            The organization and people dimension of a service covers roles and responsibilities ,formal organizational structures,culture,and required staffing and competencies to the creation, delivery, and important of a service.


3.Which service dimension is focused on an organization's relationships with other organizations in order to deliver its services?


A) Organizations and people

B) Information and technology

C) Partners and suppliers

D) Value streams and processes


Answer: C

           The partners and suppliers dimension focuses on the organization's relationships with other organizations that are involved in the design ,development, deployment,delivery,support, and/or continual improvement of services.


4. Which is not a key focus of the information and technology dimension?


A) Workflow management and inventory systems

B) Security and compliance

C) Roles and responsibilities

D) Communication systems and knowledge bases


Answer: C

            The organization and people dimension of a service covers roles and responsibilities ,formal organizational structures,culture,and required staffing and competencies to the creation, delivery, and important of a service.


5. Which service management dimension is focused on activities and how these are coordinated?


A) Organizations and people

B) Information and technology

C) Partners and suppliers

D) Value streams and processes


Answer: D

              The value stream and processes dimension focuses on what activities the organization undertakes, and how they are organized , as well as how the organization ensures that it enabling value creation for all stakeholders efficiently and effectively.


6. Which dimension of service management considers governance,management, and communication?


A) Organizations and people

B) Information and technology

C) Partners and suppliers

D) Value streams and processes



Answer: A

               It i important to ensure that the way an organization is structured and managed , as well as its roles, responsibilities, and systems of authority and communication , is well defined and supports its overall strategy and operating model.

Script Actions in ServiceNow

Script Actions :

• Events can be fired from most of the server side script elements for processing later. i.e Async processing.
• Script actions can be defined with the processing logic to process those events.
• Events are processed when the processing capability available. 
• Events are processed as user system. 
• Events may be processed in parallel if there is enough processing capacity.   i.e Schedule workers and semaphores.
• Events are defined on a table and script actions are defined on events.

Events can be triggered using, 

gs.eventQueue('procssed.load.event',gr, parmValue1,parmValue2);

Objects available in a script action: 

current  :  represents GlideRecord object of the record on which event is triggered

event : represents event parameter object.  two additional parameters can be processed to an event when it is being triggered and those parameters are accessed using event.parm1, event.parm2 in the script actions. 

Quick points: 

1.  Event and script actions can be used to develop event driven async integrations.
2.  Event and script actions can be used to defer the bulk crud operations processing to later point in time.
3.  Avoid writing lengthy script action scripts, call script includes instead.

Business Rules in ServiceNow

Business Rules :

• Business rules are the server side processing objects.  
• Can be configured to trigger on create/read/update/delete operations into a table.
• Can be configured to execute before/after/async of any of the the above operations.
• Before rules are generally used for data enrichment, validation.
• After rules are generally used to configure notifications, perform upsert operations into a related table.
• Async rules are generally used for outbound integrations, heavy processing logic which could  otherwise impact user experience. 
• Display rules can be configured to pass on values from server side to client side scripts to eliminate the round trips.
• Query rules can be configured to add additional default conditions to all the query statements performed on a table.

Objects : 

current  :  represents the current state of the record that is being processed.   Available in before, after, query, display, async business rules.

previous : represents the previous state of the record that is being processed. Available in before, after business rules.

g_scratchpad :   represents an object which can be loaded with key value pairs from server side to access at client side. Available in display business rules.

Avoid :

•  current.update()  in before business rules. Could lead to infinite loop of rule execution without  proper conditions. 
•  outbound integration calls in before/after business rules.  This impacts user experience.
•  writing lengthy scripts in advanced business rules . Use script includes instead.
•  Avoid global business rules. Use script includes where possible. 
• Avoid circular updates among related tables.  i.e Business rules on table A updating table B, and Business rules on table B, updating table A.

Stuck with ? :

Unique key violation detected by database :   Could be because of current.update() in before business rules, or circular updates.

Workflow execution order :  Workflows run before the insertion into table and after before business rules with order <= 1000.  so, adjust the order if needed.

Empty journal fields :  values of journal fields such as work_notes, comments are not available in an after business rules, use current.work_notes.getJournalEntry(1) instead. 

Activities being duplicated : Could be because of current.update() in before business rules, or circular updates between related tables.

Here are the related articles on ServiceNow

IT job market in Melbourne

IT Jobs in Melbourne, Australia: 

Either you are an experience professional recently migrated to Melbourne or student pursuing higher studies in Melbourne in the information technology, you will find this article useful if you are actively looking for a job or planning to look for a job in the near future. After having worked more than couple of years in Melbourne as an IT professional I am sharing my thoughts.

Job portals :

The best place to start is try and understand the demand for you field of expertise are the job portals. Australia best job portal Seek so do your research such as how many job openings you could see in a week or month.  

Meetups :

  Networking is everything,  start attending meetups.  Always look for an opportunity to present a session, Presenter gets the most attention,  Also you will get an opportunity to describe your current situation while introducing yourself.   

Volunteering :

If you are falling short of expectations in terms of local experience, consider working as a Volunteer. You will get to understand work culture as well as you could use references from this work place.  If you hit a jackpot you might a job from the same work place if they are impressed with your work.

Here is the portal where could apply volunteering jobs : Volunteer Jobs

Code repositories , certifications, technical blogs :

It always helps to have additional interest in the field that are you are working, Consider contributing to open source repositories or getting certifications in the technology that you are interested in.

  All the very best !!

Here are the related articles  Jobs

Most Common Interview Questions:  Interview Questions

The secrets of investing

The secrets of investing:

    This is one of the common question most people ask. Are there any secrets in investing ?  what are the mantras that successful investors must know, well in this article I will share my experiences and thoughts. 

Respect the money:

     Without compromising your lifestyle you could save money, you will have to choose your spending wisely. Buying luxuries such as expensive cars, jewelry, costly clothes on credit cards or loan eventually is going to create problems financially later.  Instead use that money to generate assets such as shares, real estate so you could buy those luxuries with your money down the line.

Once you have enough money to invest,  it is time to find the right investment so that money can work for you.  Opportunity is everything. 

Don't invest money alone:

         More often than not, most people invest their money because they have seen someone investing and they do not want to fall behind. Just alone buying a property or shares in a company is not investing. It is gambling !!. You could loose or win and as with any gambling the odds of loosing is more.   

    "Invest time and money.  More time and less money"

Sam,  John both earn $3,000 a month from 9-5 job, saves approximately $500 a month after  expenses. 

Sam left all his savings in the same bank account without any research and with the assumption that it is small savings anyway.  On the hand, John spent an hour in finding a bank with high interest rates and at the end of it, he found a bank that is offering 1% higher interest rate and he opened an account in that bank and started using for his savings. At the end of the six months, 

Sam with his current bank interest rate 4% 

Investment amount = 6*500 = $3000

Interest earned = $35

John with his current savings bank interest rate 5% 

Investment amount = 6*500 = $3000

Interest earned = $43.87

So, John has paid himself $13.87 for his 1 hour research over period of 6 months.  This may not be big amount but guess what it's real money and it is only over 6 months period with a savings of $500 a month. This will have compound affects on his wealth over a time period. 

Another example with capital risk which is where research is more important to minimize the odds in investing.

Sam,  John both earn $3,000 a month from 9-5 job, saves approximately $500 a month after  expenses. 

Sam started investing his savings into share market at the end of the each month, he invested in companies that are doing well in the current market conditions. He did not take into account market cycles and company fundamentals. 

John also wanted to invest in share market at the end of each month but he could not find the right companies to invest in every month so only he ended up investing 3 times $500 each for the 6 months period. At the end of 6 months, 

Sam, out of his 6 investments 

4 companies contributed to profits of 10% of each = $200

2 companies contributed to loss of 10% of each = -$100 

So, Sam's total profits  = $100

John, out of his 3 investments 

3 companies contributed to profits of 10% of each = $150, and he has potentially earned interest on the remaining money on his higher savings interest rate account.

So, John's total profits  = $150+

Your research and time has double benefits they will not only help you make profits but at times helps you limit losses.   

Here is another article that I wrote about Investing : Investing Strategies