What is it?
Among the steadiest performing skills of recent years is ITIL,
the IT Infrastructure Library, an approach to IT service management
(ITSM) developed by the UK government and now adopted by public
sector and commercial organisations around the world. ITIL is used
throughout Europe and the USA, and is growing fast in developing
economies such as India, China and Brazil.
Major suppliers such as IBM and Hewlett-Packard both use ITIL
internally, and include it in ITSM offerings such as IBM's Tivoli.
Although it mainly affects administration and service management
roles, developers in organisations that use it are also expected to
be aware of it.
The emphasis on professionalism, adherence to standards and best
practice has benefits for individuals, because it is supposed to
make sure their skills and experience are used to the full. If you
are at all involved in service delivery, whether as a database
administrator or taking calls on the helpdesk, ITIL could make the
difference between a career of steadily increasing responsibility,
and a succession of unfulfilling jobs.
Where did it originate?
ITIL began with the UK government's Central Computer and
Telecommunication Agency in the 1980s, and was taken over by its
successor, the Office of Government Computing.
IBM claims to have provided many of the key concepts.
ITIL was developed in parallel with BS15000, which became the ISO
20000 international standard for ITSM.
What's it for?
In its current form, version 3, ITIL consists of five books
describing the processes and roles which ensure service delivery
meets customer requirements and expectations. The
five core subjects are
service delivery, service design, service transition (long-term
change management), day-to-day service operation, and continual
service improvement.
Up to ten key roles have been identified in ITIL implementation,
from requirement analyst, process engineer and configuration
management architect to database administrator and tools support,
and of course, the trainer. This may suggest that ITIL is only for
organisations with big IT departments, but the OGC also provides
the
ITIL Small-Scale Implementation Book.
What makes it special?
Once you have worked in an ITIL role in one organisation, you
should be able to transfer your skills reasonably easily to
another.
How difficult is it to master?
Gartner Group says the majority of organisations begin by
focusing on incident management, problem management or change
management. Taking an approach based on your own role may help you
navigate through the official ITIL books and web resources, which
do not make many allowances for people new to ITIL -the current
focus of the official website being on people moving from version 2
to 3. However, there are a number of third-party sources offering
toolkits to help you.
Where is it used?
Big commercial ITIL users include Microsoft and a number of
banks, airlines and manufacturers.
Rates of pay
From the low £20,000s for helpdesk analysts and "problem
managers" to more than £40,000 for operations and change
managers.
Training
There are four levels of qualification: Foundation,
Intermediate, ITIL Expert and ITIL Master. There are many
authorised ITIL trainers around the country. Going this route will
cost you around £750 for the three-day Foundation course, plus the
exam fee, so look instead for
online courses,
which cost from about £200. The exam fee is £160 some trainers
offer discounts.
There's a public
collaboration site for ITIL practitioners. See also the
OGC's best
management practice guide.