ITIL Expert Program

Program will be offered during 2012
IT service management – the key that unlocks the value from organizations’ IT investments

Most organizations today rely upon IT to enable them to achieve their company vision, business strategy and goals.
Organizations use IT to:
• Revolutionize the way they operate, communicate and do business
• Develop and innovate, gain market advantage and differentiate themselves to their end customers
• Drive increased productivity and efficiency, improve business processes, make cost savings and increase sales and growth
• Communicate with a larger, more global marketplace.
The quality of an organization’s IT is reflected in its reputation and brand, and has direct impact upon sales and revenue. The cost of IT is never insignificant – it is essential to get good value from IT investments, but often this value is not realized. For an IT investment to provide benefit, the resulting IT service must be well planned, well designed, well managed and well delivered. That is what the practice of IT service management is about.
IT service management is:
• The professional practice of planning, designing, developing, delivering and optimizing IT services that are both fit for purpose and fit for use, thereby providing best value and return on investment for the organization that uses them
• A specialized discipline, which includes the processes, methods, activities, functions and roles that a service provider needs in order to deliver IT services which provide business value for customers
-A growing profession of people, skilled and committed to delivering high-quality IT services which bring measurable value for businesses.
Good IT service management is essential to achieve business benefits from IT at an agreed and controlled cost. Without good IT service management, it is common for IT projects to fail or go well over budget at project stage, for ongoing IT costs of ownership to spiral out of control, and for businesses to fail to achieve the benefits they expected.
Good IT service management is the key that unlocks the value from your IT investments.

ITIL – global best-practice IT service management
ITIL is the most widely adopted guidance for IT service management worldwide. It is non-proprietary best practice that can be adapted for use in all business and organizational environments.
ITIL was created by experts who incorporated the learning experiences and practices of leading organizations, ‘best-in-class’ practitioners and IT service providers from around the world. Since its introduction in the early 1990s, ITIL has proved itself through the positive impact it has brought to businesses that adopt its practices.
ITIL provides an extensive body of knowledge, capabilities and skills. It is accessible through publications, training, qualifications and support tools, and is available in many languages.
ITIL’s value proposition centers on the IT service provider (internal IT or external supplier) understanding a customer’s business objectives and priorities, and the role that IT services play in enabling these objectives to be met. ITIL adopts a ‘lifecycle’ approach to IT services, focusing on practices for service strategy, service design, service transition, service operation and continual service improvement:

• Service strategy: collaboration between business strategists and IT to develop IT service strategies that support the business strategy
• Service design: designing the overarching IT architecture and each IT service to meet customers’ business objectives by being both fit for purpose and fit for use
• Service transition: managing and controlling changes into the live IT operational environment, including the development and transition of new or changed IT services
• Service operation: delivering and supporting operational IT services in such a way that they meet business needs and expectations and deliver forecasted business benefits
• Continual service improvement: learning from experience and adopting an approach which ensures continual improvement of IT services.

The benefits of adopting ITIL
From a business perspective, the adoption of ITIL practices by IT service providers – whether in-house providers or external suppliers – ensures many benefits, including:

• IT services which align better with business priorities and objectives, meaning that the business achieves more in terms of its strategic objectives
• Known and manageable IT costs, ensuring the business better plans its finances
• Increased business productivity, efficiency and effectiveness, because IT services are more reliable and work better for the business users
• Financial savings from improved resource management and reduced rework
• More effective change management, enabling the business to keep pace with change and drive business change to its advantage
• Improved user and customer satisfaction with IT
• Improved end-customer perception and brand image.