ITIL  - the most widely recognised approach to IT Service Management in the world.

What Is It?

The IT Infrastructure Library (ITIL) series consists of seven books providing guidance on the planning, delivery and management of quality IT services to support business needs. 

Quality driven IT Service Management is a cornerstone of business success. ITIL has been designed to help organisations develop and manage their IT more efficiently and cost effectively.

Developed in conjunction with both public and private sector organisations worldwide, ITIL provides a comprehensive, consistent and coherent set of processes for IT management and is underpinned by formal qualifications and an associated training scheme.

Developed in the late 1980s, and still owned by the UK government, ITIL was a recognition that increasingly organisations are becoming dependent on IT in order to satisfy their corporate aims and meet their business needs. This increasing dependency leads to a growing requirement for high quality IT services. In this context quality means matched to business needs and user requirements as these evolve.

Who Uses ITIL?

The ITIL approach has been adopted by hundreds of organisations worldwide including Microsoft, Barclays Bank, Guinness, Procter & Gamble, Telstra, Fujitsu, and Hewlett Packard.

Why Use ITIL?

"ITIL codifies IT services management best practices. Among the benefits associated with adopting the libraries best practices, clients have identified, improved customer satisfaction with IT services, better communications and information flows between IT staff and customers, and reduced costs in developing procedures and practices within an enterprise". 
Source: GartnerGroup Nov 1998

ITIL can help with IT provision by providing:

- Better Customer Service: ITIL will deliver better services which are tailored to the needs of the customer

- Better Cost Effectiveness: ITIL assists organisations in providing a quality IT service within a business environment affected by budgetary constraints but also growing user expectations.

- Better Motivation and Productivity: ITIL encourages staff to view IT Service Management as a recognised professional skill, ultimately increasing effective performance.

In 1999, GarnerGroup predicted:

"By 2002, the global internet user population will exceed 140 million people, with electronic commerce approaching $1 trillion annually (0.7 probability)".

"Through 2002, successful enterprises will invest 75 percent of their IT support budgets in process and organisational development (0.8 probability)".

In order to be successful, organisations have to recognise that IT Service Management is not the management of technologies, but a strategic framework that brings together the technology, people and processes, to increase effectiveness, reduce costs, and increase productivity.

ITIL provides that strategic framework.