Simulation game – Apollo 13

Learn and experience the benefits of ITIL V3 best practice solutions during the ‘Apollo 13 – an ITSM case experience™

Course Overview

‘Houston, we have a problem’ Fifty-five hours and fifty-five minutes into the mission. On board Apollo 13 the astronauts suddenly hear a loud ‘bang’. The bang is the explosion of the liquid oxygen tank #2 in the Service Module, providing vital oxygen used by the fuel cells that are Apollo’s primary power source. The backup battery-powered electric supply in the Command and Service Module (CSM) has a lifetime of up to ten hours. Unfortunately, Apollo 13 and the astronauts are 87 hours from home. Their spacecraft is slowly dying. They have a serious problem, unless you and the ground support staff start working as a team to solve this problem. But remember, time is running out. Fast. Welcome to the ‘Apollo 13 – an ITSM case experience™’ simulation game.

One-day training offering real, life situations

The ‘Apollo 13 – an ITSM case experience™’ simulation game is an intense, one-day training in which ITIL V3 concepts and processes are experienced through the use of an interactive game. In this training, real life situations taken from the Apollo 13 mission are simulated. You will work in a team, playing the roles of the Mission Control Center in Houston. Your mission: bring the crippled spacecraft and its crew safely home. By doing so, you and your colleagues will learn and experience all the benefits of ITIL best practice solutions.

What is the simulation game about?

In this game, you will work in a team consisting of 8 to 13 Mission Control Center members. This team will experience the four phases of the mission (as described above), within the simulation the team must translate the NASA strategy into service designs for ‘Building & Launching’ and for ‘Maintaining and Supporting’ the mission. The team must transition the Apollo 13 launch vehicle and supporting facilities into live Service operation. During the live mission operation the team will be confronted with events, incidents and requests from the crew. In each round, the team undergoes the following steps: designing or improving their processes, running the simulation, reflecting, and reporting. Throughout the game various ITIL processes are necessary to enable ground staff, the crew and the Mission Director prioritize decisions and choices in order to resolve problems and make timely changes to the spacecraft configuration and its trajectory. Although the game has been designed to learn ITIL concepts Apollo 13 can equally be applied in any organization wanting to experience the benefits of process based ways of working and team working.

The game is designed for

  • ICT employees, ICT managers, process managers, team managers, and others who need to improve their working processes.
  • Employees requiring (more) ITIL knowledge or experience.
  • Employees who have followed the ITIL Foundation course and want to experience the ITIL processes in practice.
  • Employees responsible for applying best practices or improving their own processes and procedures.
  • Managers and employees wanting to see, feel and experience the benefits of process based ways of working.

Goals of the simulation game

  • You will learn how to use ITIL to create IT Service management capabilities that are a strategic asset.
  • You will learn how good IT Service management capabilities enable you to manage cost and risk and at the same time deliver business value.
  • You will learn how to translate business demands into service solutions and demonstrate measurable results.
  • You will learn how to use a Continual Improvement approach for identifying and removing risks and weaknesses and for realizing performance improvements.
  • You will learn how integrated People, Process, Products and Partners enable you to deliver value.
  • You will learn how good management tooling will help manage & control the workflow more effectively and efficiently and support knowledge capture and sharing.
  • You will understand the interdependency of processes.
  • You will learn how to cooperate and how to improve working processes by designing and implementing as a team. • You will learn the importance of clearly defined, agreed, understood and embedded tasks, roles, responsibility and accountability.
  • You will have gained insight into possible improvements in your own working environment.

 The uniqueness of this game!

  • The entire life cycle of services is used within the learning process.
  • A balanced set of performance indicators, relating to business demands for UTILITY (Increase in gains) and WARRANTY (decrease in possible losses) is used.
  • The Mission Operations Control organization, including the Suppliers is closely related to an IT Service organization and its network of suppliers.
  • Service level reporting is required at the end of each round to identify risks, costs and demonstrate Performance and value.
  • All four game rounds are different and add increasing levels of complexity ensuring that the participants continuously improve their capabilities.
  • Between game rounds, participants apply Continual Improvement approaches.
  • The effect of improvements can be measured and demonstrated.
  • Quality frameworks such as ISO/IEC 20000 can be used during the game to help identify non-compliance issues and specify improvement needs.
  • Real life events and situations are used for reflection purposes.

Training Info

 Duration            : 1 Days

Date                     : TBA

Language            : Conducted in English Language

Contact                : T  02 670 8980 – 3 ext. 308

                                : F  02 670 8984
: E  [email protected]