A Best Practice Approach to Implementing a Proactive Patch Management Strategy

A successful patch management strategy requires planning, implementation and operational best practices. A best practice approach to the planning phase ensures that the service levels required by the business can be defined correctly. These service levels drive the architecture and operational requirements of the patch management strategy concisely and the decision making process in choosing a technical solution. Implementation best practices ensure that the patch management solution does not impact the business and is capable of supporting the business goals. Operational best practices allow each monthly software patch cycle to be uniformly managed and coordinated across the enterprise change management groups to support the business needs.