Do we Need ITIL?

The IT Infrastructure Library (or ITIL) is essentially aadapted to fit the specific needs and conditions of the
body of knowledge, structures and ‘bestorganisation. This means that IT departments do not
practices’ related to the provision of quality IThave to reinvent the wheel in order to develop an
services.effective method for designing, implementing and
It is an invaluable resource for IT service professionalsmonitoring their services.
who need to widen the scope of their understandingITIL also ensures a focus on the end result of the
of IT Service Management. It has also beenservices provided. By forcing IT departments to look at
widely-introduced within organisations as athe bigger picture (What is the value of the service for
ready-made working model, in order to achieve athe customer? What is the benefit that the service
standardised service management method.provides?), ITIL guards against a tendency to see the
For Individualsservice as an end in itself, and the provision of the
One major advantage of ITIL for individuals workingservice as the limit of the IT department’s interest
within and alongside IT Service Management is that theand responsibility.
collated information is teachable, and further that it isFinally, by utilising ITIL, companies gain access to a
regularly taught and examined as part of ordinarynetwork of IT Service Management professionals and
progress towards a career in IT services.organisations. There are the continuously updated and
This means that IT professionals acquire a set ofimproved ITIL publications and standard guides,
common principles and expectations, preventingfrequent conferences and user-group workshops. The
miscommunication and service failure. It also provides aITIL qualification system also enables recruiting
clear and proven track to IT Service Managementorganisations to tell at a glance the level and quality of
expertise. This has enabled the introduction oftraining that a potential employee has received.
industry-standard qualifications, which demonstrateFinding out more
knowledge and understanding of ITIL at four differentThe ‘library’ part of the IT Infrastructure Library
levels, over a variety of different ITIL modules.consists of over twenty titles designed to help
For more information about the ITIL qualification, take aindividuals and organisations find out more about ITIL.
look at this introduction to the course.There are also introductory and advanced training
For Organisationscourses designed to teach the core components and
There are three additional advantages to organisationsthe individual modules of the ITIL knowledge base. To
in adopting the ITIL methodology in the IT services thatlearn more about how these modules are structured,
they provide. The first, already hinted at above, is thatplease see our article about the ITIL professional
ITIL provides a ready-made model that can bequalifications.