Discovery, Service Mapping and Event Management
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Feb 17, 2026
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Big Picture
Discovery and Service Mapping populate and enrich the CMDB.
Event Management consumes and acts on CMDB data.
CMDB Governance protects and sustains all of it.
Now let’s connect them properly.
Discovery → CMDB Foundation
Identifies infrastructure CIs (servers, network, cloud resources)
Updates attributes using IRE
Keeps infrastructure layer fresh
Provides technical relationships (IP, host, device)
Without Discovery:
CMDB becomes manual
Data freshness dies
Completeness suffers
Discovery builds the technical layer of CMDB.
Service Mapping → Business Context
Maps Applications → Infrastructure
Builds service dependency models
Connects business services to underlying components
Enables impact analysis
Discovery tells you:
“What exists?”
Service Mapping tells you:
“What supports what?”
Service Mapping builds the logical & business layer of CMDB.
Event Management → Operational Intelligence
Receives events from monitoring tools
Matches events to CIs in CMDB
Correlates events
Creates incidents based on CI relationships
Event Management depends on:
Accurate CI identification
Proper relationships
Service mapping for impact visibility
If CMDB relationships are wrong it leads to:
Wrong service impact
Noise incidents
False major incidents
Event Management consumes CMDB intelligence.
CMDB Governance → Stability & Trust
Governance ensures:
Proper identification & reconciliation rules
Controlled CI lifecycle
Data owner accountability
Certification cycles
Deletion controls
No rogue updates bypassing IRE
Without governance:
Discovery creates duplicates
Service Mapping breaks
Events attach to wrong CIs
Trust collapses
Governance protects data integrity across all modules.
The Relationship in One Flow
Discovery → populates infrastructure
Service Mapping → connects it to business
Event Management → monitors and reacts
Governance → ensures everything stays accurate over time.
Regards,
Anish
https://www.servicenow.com/community/cmdb-articles/discovery-service-mapping-and-event-management/ta-p/3490689