I finished my previous column just before the announcement of the new version, sorry edition, of ITIL. Now that OGC has announced that there will be a new edition, let’s try to estimate whether they will be able to fix the flaws. My overall estimate is that it is not entirely impossible but highly improbable. Where there’s a will there’s a way, but is there real will?

The first fatal flaw is that ITIL V3 is first and foremost a commercial instrument. This is hard to change but not impossible. OGC has given APMG and TSO too important roles in ITIL development. A new set of partners could improve things. EXIN and Van Haren would be better partners. I understand that OGC has to seek partners by open bids but if they put “long experience and recognized status in ITSM” they should be able to pick EXIN and Van Haren as winners.

An interesting little episode has been the tool certification program by APMG. Ken Turbit’s one-man-show did not convince many but then APMG bit the bullet and recognized Pink Verify, or maybe David Ratcliffe recognized APMG. I wonder did Pink pay APMG to get the ITIL logo or did APMG actually pay Pink Elephant to get them to accept the ITIL V3 logo and lend some credibility to the sorry scheme?

I would definitely like to see APM Group go as they have failed worst. The APMG exam program has been so bad that OGC should terminate the contract and sue APMG for damaging ITIL’s brand image.

The second fatal flaw is the disconnection between the five books. It is promising that OGC has admitted this flaw as OGC states: Look at remedying inconsistencies within the content of the five books: Editing should be fairly easy. There is the touchy issue of deciding which book is right but a competent editor should be able to do this. Another touchy issue is the forgotten processes which are mentioned in other books but not described anywhere. One example is Business Relationship Management. OGC says that there will not be any new concepts but Business Relationship Management and Proactive Problem Management are key concepts, they must be included in the new edition event though they are new to V3.

The third fatal flaw is the attempt to rule the world. I have been arguing this with the IT Skeptic, who is a great fan of CobiT and argues that ITIL should cover the same area. We should remember that ITIL stands for IT Infrastructure Library. ITIL was designed for a limited audience of IT infrastructure managers and it has been a great success there.

In my daily work as a consultant and trainer I meet people who are in charge of the IT infrastructure and only that. In my market it is now quite common to separate the roles of Information Management and IT Services. The CIO is in charge of IT architecture and application development. IT Services manages the infrastructure and sells their services to the CIO. What the IT Service providers need is the core ITIL: Service Desk, Incident, Problem, Change, Release and Service Level Management.

Strategy in the sense of ITIL V3 is not relevant to the internal IT infrastructure provider, there is no real marketplace and they have very little to say in the question of Service Portfolio. Modern business decision makers understand the importance of IT solutions and they have taken it in their hands. The central IT just provides a platform for the services and applications that business acquires.

The Strategy book should be rewritten in this sense. The IT Service provider cannot lock the company in some strict long term strategy; the IT must have a fast and agile strategy which can respond to the changes decided by their business units. I have once listened to one of the authors of the book behind that link, Mikko Kosonen. His presentation opened my eyes to see the dangers in traditional strategic thinking.

The IT Service provider has some strategic decision to make. Release strategy is one, Continuity strategy is second. They have to make strategic choices between security and flexibility. The Strategy book should explain how to read company strategy and how to apply it to IT decisions.

The fourth fatal flaw was to tinker with the central best practices. The definition of Incident is plain crazy. There is an excellent discussion on the matter at the IT Skeptics site, see Camels and Committees if you haven’t done that yet.

Problem Management is mangled beyond recognition. I have read that the authors visited several sites and rewrote the processes based on current practices. Unfortunately the original Problem Management is a brilliant process but people find it hard to grasp. It is not surprising that the implementations of Problem Management have failed in many sites, it needs a mature environment and the big US corporations they have been visiting were hardly there yet. The end result has been that the authors have replaced the best practice of ITIL with the bad practice of incompetent practitioners.

The only solution is to rewrite the Service Operation book. Use V2 text and models and be careful with changing the text. Cut out all unnecessary stuff. OGC’s Refresh-the-Refresh statement says: Clarify that the organizational structures given as examples are indicative rather than prescriptive. Please, just cut the rubbish about the organizational models out. The models reminded me of my employer in mid 80’s.