ement Applications provider. It is quite common to integrate customer problem management with service problem management and resource/network problem manage- ment applications. 28. Partner management: The service provider offering maximum value for the money and has the maximum number of services are the best choice for most customers. To be competitive in the telecom market, most service providers offer a lot of services from partners to add to their service portfolio. This gives the customers the flexibility to choose from a wide variety of services. Service providers can also form channel partners to offer their products to other markets where they are not direct players. Revenue from the customer for service packages needs to be shared among these value chain entities based on predefined agreements. Partner management applications handle all inter- actions including revenue settlement and scenarios where the transactions with partners have to happen in real time. 29. Work force management: This application is intended to manage the tasks performed by field service executives. When a new work order or trouble ticket is raised that needs support from a field support executive or techni- cian, an appropriate resource is identified for completing the task using a work force management application. This is achieved by keeping an active record of the resource mapping the field skill sets, work load, current loca- tion, and SO on, which helps to map the task to most appropriate resource. The application is mainly intended for service provisioning for a new order or change in settings and for service assurance to handle a trouble condition. There are different attributes of a work force professional that needs to be considered in allocating tasks. These attributes include shift time, job func- tions, skill sets, and availability. Along with work force attributes the service provider attributes like optimal staffing, cost to resolve, and expected daily work load also needs to be considered. The results of the task are