ITIL and good practice in Service Management

The context of this publication is the ITIL Framework as a source of good practice in Service Management. ITIL is used by organizations world wide to establish and improve capabilities in Service Management. ISO/IEC 20000 provides a formal and universal standard for organizations seeking to have their Service Management capabilities audited and certified. While ISO/IEC 20000 is a standard to be achieved and maintained, ITIL offers a body of knowledge useful for achieving the standard.

The ITIL Library has the following components:

• ITIL Core: best-practice guidance applicable to all types of organizations that provide services to a business
• ITIL Complementary Guidance: a complementary set of publications with guidance specific to industry sectors, organization types, operating models and technology architectures.

The ITIL Core consists of five publications (see Figure 1.2). Each provides the guidance necessary for an integrated approach as required by the ISO/IEC 20000 standard specification:

• Service Strategy
• Service Design
• Service Transition
• Service Operation
• Continual Service Improvement.

Figure 1.2 ITIL Core

Each publication addresses capabilities having direct impact on a service provider’s performance. The structure of the core is in the form of a lifecycle. It is iterative and multidimensional. It ensures that organizations are set up to leverage capabilities in one area for learning and improvements in others. The Core is expected to provide structure, stability and strength to Service Management capabilities, with durable principles, methods and tools. This serves to protect investments and provide the necessary basis for measurement, learning and improvement.

The guidance in ITIL can be adapted for changes of use in various business environments and organizational strategies. The Complementary Guidance provides flexibility to implement the Core in a diverse range of environments. Practitioners can select Complementary Guidance as needed to provide traction for the Core in a given business context, much as tyres are selected based on the type of automobile, purpose and road conditions. This is to increase the durability and portability of knowledge assets and to protect investments in Service Management capabilities.

Date: 2014-12-29; view: 1202