Originally posted on devclass.com, June 22, 2021 and written by Joseph Martins. Sponsored Experience is everything when it comes to delivering IT-enabled products and services. But it’s no longer about how many deadlines your team smashed, how often you’d exceeded service-level agreements (SLAs), or how many lines of code you’ve spat out. Rather it’s about how the services and products you deliver impact the rest of the organisation’s ability to do their jobs, increase productivity, deliver customer satisfaction and co-create value. “Experience” may be seen as subjective, even ephemeral, compared to the traditional IT metrics, deadlines and SLAs. But if you want proof of its importance, consider how ITIL® 4, the latest revision of the best practice framework for service management from AXELOS, focuses on improving user experience of digital services and how this enhances productivity right across the organisation. Ian Aitchison, VP Product Management at Nexthink, the leader in digital

ITIL is turning 25 this year.  In honor of this milestone, AXELOS commissioned a study ( The Importance of ITIL® – A Global View – 2014 and Beyond ) to provide a global and independent assessment of the current perception of ITIL, engaging nearly 400 C-Level and medium tier service managers in key international regions across a range of industries. One of the stated reasons that the study was commissioned is because ITIL’s benefits are being questioned in light of factors such as cloud computing, more advanced automation, and agile. The results of the study reaffirm ITIL’s value, particularly in the eyes of IT executives. In fact, according to the study, just under 70% of executives indicated that ITIL is becoming more important in light of these trends. Some interesting results include: 71% of those surveyed view ITIL as playing a tangible role in supporting the move to DevOps and Agile  ITIL 2011 adopters are more likely to see ITIL as growing in importance   40%

I recently attended a great opportunity to connect, learn and grow at the itSMF USA Fusion 10 Conference in Louisville, Kentucky. It was a wonderful chance to see old friends and acquaintances, to meet and make new friends and learn from some of the most articulate and impressive speakers on ITSM and ITIL available in the industry. I came away with some key points that I thought I would share with you so you can also gain the benefit and value of the data, information, knowledge and wisdom presented at the Conference. Here are my key take0aways: Service Management is alive and well. A new wave of users and supporters has emerged and were present at the show. I saw and met so many new people. I was impressed that ITSM and ITIL has not simply remained in the hands of a core group of users but has found continued life among new industries and implementers. ITSM and ITIL seem to be growing especially among colleges and university IT departments and in the medical and scientif

Some IT executives and practitioners still believe that Agile is the way to success for transformation. Some IT executives and practitioners will argue that ITIL is the way to go. Some will say LEAN should be the approach to ensure success. Oh, you say, “they are all wrong?”  Perhaps you think DevOps and Continuous Delivery is the silver bullet? Well guess what?    You are all right.  The truth of the matter is that no one best practice or method stands alone.  There are far too many examples of how this trinity of LEAN, Agile, and ITSM enable DevOps for digital transformation.  ITIL’s Continual Service Improvement (CSI) Approach - Iterative ongoing continual service improvement is at the core of every Service Management Principle. The concept of ‘adopt and adapt’ involves adapting best practices to an organization's circumstances, needs, goals and objectives . Using Agile and Scrum will help increase your velocity. LEAN will help to remove waste to help w

I was recently asked how ITIL helps in the management of the SDLC (Software Development Lifecycle).  Simply put... SDLC is a Lifecycle approach to produce the software or the "product".  ITIL is a Lifecycle approach that focuses on the "service". I’ll start by reviewing both SDLC and ITIL Lifecycles and then summarize: SDLC  -  The intent of an SDLC process is to help produce a product that is cost-efficient, effective and of high quality. Once an application is created, the SDLC maps the proper deployment of the software into the live environment. The SDLC methodology usually contains the following stages: Analysis (requirements and design), construction, testing, release and maintenance.  The focus here is on the Software.  Most organizations will use an Agile or Waterfall approach to implement the software through the Software Development Lifecycle. ITIL  -  is a best practice for IT service management (ITSM) that focuses on aligning IT services with the

If you have ITIL Expert Certification or 17 ITIL v3 Credits you are eligible to transition UP!  The Managing Professional Transition certification classes are filling up quickly, and are only available for a limited to, so we recommend that you grab your seat..."while the getting is good" :-).  ITIL 4 Foundation is NOT a prerequisite. However, the Foundation course provides exposure to concepts and practices which aren't covered in MPT. The ITIL 4 Foundation Module of MPT will give you a good introduction to the Service Value System, The Service Value Chain, Service Relationships and more. Reach out to the Academy team for your discount on your ITIL 4 Foundation training. Managing Professional Transition will start you on your journey for new ways of thinking and new ways to approach best practice and like any other bridge or transition class, it has a short shelf life! The Managing Professional Transition Course covers: Key ITIL 4 concepts And from the adv

The Professor has kindly lent me his blog to share the latest ITIL Library update - Jayne It was recently announced that the 2011 Edition of the ITIL Core Library will publish on July 29, 2011. Notice that I did not refer to the new release with a new version number - and with good reason. All future revisions to the ITIL publications will be referenced by the year that it was published. ITIL will finally just be ITIL. If you regard the 2011 ITIL update as the equivalent to the revision of a college textbook, you'll understand why this is not a big deal. Academic textbooks are revised on a regular schedule without much fanfare or impact on prior or future students. Past attendees do not retake their final exams or replace their textbook. Just a normal course of continual improvement. Do you base your decision on whether to take a college course on the edition of the textbook being used?  Not really.  What's important is the relevancy of the topic.    The 2011 ITIL Edit

Think slow and hard about that statement; Drive Stakeholder Value ! Sometimes we see and use terminology so much that the power of the statement gets lost. This is one we must hear and ignite if we have any hope of meeting the evolving door of consumer requirements.  The Drive Stakeholder Value (DSV) certification course is available within the ITIL 4 Managing Professional stream of certification.  Therefore, DSV is also a module and one of the focus areas in the Managing Professional Transition (MPT) class.  Confused? Take a look at this graphic : ITIL 4 Managing Professional Transition  is a course that provides ITIL Experts or those that have at least 17 ITIL v3 credits a fast-track way to obtain the ITIL Managing Professional certification. This course excerpts key concepts from ITIL 4 Foundation and from each of the four Managing Professional modules. The Managing Professional stream of certification courses targets IT practitioners working within technolo

The role of the Process Practitioner is by far one of the most critical, and is sometimes overlooked in lieu of others such as Process Managers and Process Owners.  Don’t misunderstand, Managers and Owners are important and are key success factors, but the Process Practitioner role is where the rubber meets the road.  This is the role assigned to individuals who will be performing the work on a day to day basis.  ITIL has always emphasized the need for clearly defined roles for Process Owners and Process Managers. ITIL also speaks to the role of Service Owner, an individual who is accountable for and represents the end-to-end service.   Within each process, there may also be roles that are designed to carry out certain process activities … these are the “Practitioners”. Without this role and skill set everything else becomes a moot point. Successful service management dictates that specific individuals are assigned to specific roles with specific responsibilities for one or more p

Trends such as virtualization, cloud computing, and agile development have all prompted the need for leaner, more efficient, and more highly automated ITSM processes. Probably one of the things that is most misunderstood about ITIL is that it is a highly scalable framework. Organizations need to understand that if their processes are bureaucratic, it’s most likely because they have made them that way. So in the spirit of continual improvement, what’s an organization to do… throw out ITIL and start over? That’s what the DevOps folks would have you think. If you haven’t heard of DevOps, according to Wikipedia the term refers to the emerging understanding of the interdependence of development and operations in meeting a business' goal to produce timely software products and services. DevOps has been referred to as (1) a movement, (2) an approach, and one blogger went so far so refer to it as (3) a “framework of ideas and principles designed to foster cooperation, learning and coo

These “Three Golden Keys” are powerful! They can unlock the power of your ITIL 4  Qualification and will accelerate your journey in the right direction as you achieve one goal after another! Believe in Challenging the Status Quo With ITIL 4  Get out of the box. It is a new world. Leaders and teams will succeed by creating an environment to challenge the status quo. You are free, to give yourself permission to question the status quo of your organization and invite others to join you. We must stop doing the same thing over and over again and yet expect a different result. Use the idea of a Service Value System, Value Streams, and the four dimensions and apply the ITIL Guiding Principles as you “Challenge The Status Quo”. Real change begins with YOU!  Keep The Momentum Going!  Getting your ITIL 4 Qualification is a huge milestone in your learning and career path. Once there, the real journey begins. Be sure to get the most value from your accomplishment and the best

Today technology has been integrated into almost every aspect of business and continues to grow in importance with every new innovation. It is impacting organizational structures, business processes, how and what products and services we offer to our customers.  This tidal wave of change is increasing in complexity and velocity.  These dynamics are shaping the strategies we must employ to manage our IT environments. Given the changes that are happening in the digital world today, support organizations have had to look at how to enhance and speed up the traditional waterfall approach to management of our IT infrastructures.  ITIL and Agile are not contradictory of each other.   Agile development provides opportunities to assess the direction of a project throughout its development lifecycle.  It is a methodology on how to deliver projects , that is iterative, adaptive and an incremental approach to project management which can be used for almost any type of project. ITIL   is

Guest Host Post by Jeff Jensen , previously posted on Jeff's Blog , February 23, 2021 I thought it would be valuable for me to share my own personal thoughts on what you will be able to do differently or better as a result of investing your time and money in becoming an ITIL 4 certified Strategic Leader : ITIL 4 Foundation WHY this class is worthwhile ITIL 4 Foundation introduces a brand new framework and concepts to reflect modern ways of working while providing guidance on how an IT organization can both position itself as a high-performing organization and improve its products, services, and underpinning practices and capabilities.  The class introduces the Service Value System, which is a systems thinking framework t hat is foundational for showing how an organization can visualize the end-to-end delivery for current state products and services, as well as utilize the guidance as a means to improve. This class is also the foundational basis of more advanced learning in the IT