What is ITIL and how can I use it within my IT organization?

What is ITIL and how can I use it within my IT organization?

Best Practices breed organizational excellence

Are your systems constantly going down for unplanned outages due to someone implementing a ‘fix’ for another workload? Your organization was unaware of the change and its potential impact on other areas of the business. Perhaps there is an opportunity to look at implementing an Information Technology Service Management (ITSM) plan.

ITSM is an organizational strategy that is built on one of many frameworks. Some of the more popular ones include, Information Technology Infrastructure Library (ITIL), ISO 20000, Six Sigma, and ISO 27001. ITIL v3 is now the de-facto ITSM framework for many companies across the globe. It has 5 areas of focus: Strategy, Design, Transition, Operations, and Continual Service Improvement. This is the first installment of a 6 part series in which I will dive into the 5 components that make up ITIL.

What is ITIL?

ITIL came about in the 1980’s when the need arose for best practices in Information Technology. There are multiple versions, v3 being the most popular among all frameworks. Understanding what ITIL is, will help organizations develop a customer centric approach to IT. The foundation of the framework is the idea that a set of best practices are used to maximize the value of technology within the organization. The beauty behind ITIL, is that the best practices are not company or even vertical specific. Rather they can be applied by any organization that uses technology. Implementing an ITSM strategy utilizing ITIL enables businesses to create consistent repeatable processes that creates value to the organization.

The IT Department becomes empowered to drive technology within the organization, instead of being considered a necessary evil in some places. As we dive into the 5 different components, you will discover just how complex and detailed the framework is. The nice thing about it is that as an organization, you can implement it to any level of your liking, and not completely. If there are processes that do not need to be fit into the framework, they don’t have to be shoe-horned into it. Having this flexibility will allow organizations to effective customize their own ITSM strategy and mature at their own pace.

What’s Next?

Make sure to check back as I dive into the difference facets of ITIL and how to incorporate them into your ITSM strategy. I'll also be showing how we here at Cima use ITIL within our own CimaCare Managed Services offering. If you would like to have a more in depth discussion around implementing ITSM and ITIL in your organization, please drop us a line!


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