As one attempts to boil the phases down to one or two positions, it begins to dawn on the mind that perhaps SMB's have no real economic justification for self-suppporting an IT infrastructure other than desktops and applications. In that case, just one position handles all phases with drastically reduced workloads on infrastructure services (server and network hardware, OS, and Midlevel services being outsourced).

The math then becomes simple. Outside server service providers hit hardest on the cost of storage. As soon as that price approaches the labor cost of two employees the time has arrived to consider an inhouse approach.

At that point the MOF can be reduced to three positions. The CIO handles Optimizing. The System Admin handles Operating and MSF work. The junior tech handles Changing and Supporting.

I wish ITIL or MS or one of the others would address this specifically. It was quite a slog to do on my own.