Entirety of policies, processes, procedures and related resources and capabilities aiming at effectively performing management tasks in a given context and for a given subject
Note 1: A management system is generally intangible. It is based on the idea of a systematic, structured and process-oriented way of managing.
Note 2: While documentation (such as process definitions, procedures and records) and tools (such as workflow support and monitoring tools) can be parts of a management system, management system considerations are not limited to the questions of documentation and tool support.
Note 3: With respect to (IT) service management and the FitSM standard series, the idea of a service management system (SMS) is a central concept, where the context of the management system is the organisational context of the service provider, and the subject is to plan, deliver, operate and control (IT) services.