Systems and methods of managing PNF connectivity are provided. A NM determines to add to or remove external connectivity from a PNF and transmits a NS update request to a NFVO that contains an identifier of the NS instance to be updated, an indication of a type of update operation requested, and information of the PNF connectivity to be changed. A NS update response contains a lifecycle operation occurrence identifier identifying a NS lifecycle operation occurrence. Separate NS lifecycle change notification from the NFVO indicate that a NS update to change the connectivity of the PNF has started and a result of the change. The notifications include the lifecycle operation occurrence identifier.