The IT Skeptic Awards for 2011

Every year the IT Skeptic website starts the New Year with our Awards. (You can see past years' awards here).

Of course the big news of the ITSM year was ITIL V3.1 2011. The Orwellian Orb of Truth went to The Cabinet Office for describing this as an update, not an upgrade or a new version, despite involving four new processes and a rewrite of an entire core book. They should get some sort of consistency award for their long-running ability to play down the scope of change. The Cabinet Office also carried off the Deng Xiao Peng Memorial Spittoon for Services to Democracy for the lack of public consultation in the new version update, in stark contrast to the development of COBIT 5 at around the same time.

The Little Blue Pill for services to public sanity goes to the British Government for the THIRD year running, this time for disbanding OGC. What they saved in eliminating the highly paid executives alone would justify this move. Hopefully now the Cabinet Office will concentrate more on complying with government policy and delivering a public service than on building a revenue-earning empire of trademarked and copyrighted products.

Before OGC disappeared they managed to win the Transparency Cup by renewing the outsourcing contracts for TSO to publish ITIL books and APMG to accredit ITIL training without any consultation with the ITIL community. The news filters quietly down from the castle long after all is done and dusted.

The Zen Award for One Hand Clapping goes to the IT Skeptic for the non-event that was Free ITIL. A grand total of about 300 people out of over a million certified ITIListas rallied to the cause and called for ITIL intellectual property to be liberated.

The response to Free ITIL earned The UK Cabinet Office the "Beware of the Leopard" Shield for Official Obfuscation for their stalwart avoidance of the issue.

The Cabinet Office also won the Black Bowler and Brollie for the blanket of silence that fell over the huffy exit of the founding creator of OGC's ITIL Software Scheme.

The Al Gore Trophy for Outrageous Hyperbole goes to Forrester, whose analysts made at least two lunatic pronouncements in 2011, aimed more at media attention than reason. First Mike Gualtieri said "I Don't Want DevOps. I Want NoOps." Then normally-temperate Glenn O'Donnell said "Abolish the CAB!". Pro Tip: memes only go viral if they have more than shock value.

The Trump Medal for Most Inappropriate Empire Building goes to itSMF International for turning certification of ITIL Experts into a monster all-embracing land-grab for IT professional certification.

The Don Quixote Cup goes to all those who continue to seek to fix ITSM with a tool or website, especially those who think an open repository will attract marvelous content. Such naivety is admirable, even sweet. Runners up were all the groups battling to retain privacy on the internet.

In a similar vein, the Rainbow Headband for hippy-dippy idealistic nonsense goes to all those in the Agile, Lean or DevOps movements who think people perform better when you set them free and a practical approach can be based on multi-skilled super-humans.

The Tienanmen Trophy for Crushed Hopes goes to itSMF International, for failure of the "Dallas Spring" of new transparency, which didn't last long. The last published Annual Report to Chapters was in January 2010 (it is labelled "2009/2010" on the website but is in fact the 2009 report) and the last "Board Talk" I can find was June 2010. So much for

We are very mindful of the fact that we are a membership-based organization and that we are ultimately accountable for our decisions and actions to the National Chapters and the itSMF members in those chapters.

The Service Management Entrepreneural Championship for 2011 goes to IT Governance, a trainer and retailer, for their skillful leveraging of their relationship with itSMF USA - not to mention itSMF's branding - in order to promote their own products. itSMFUSA earned the Cobbler's Children's Shoes for their governance of their suppliers.

Lastly, as always, our grand prize, The Grand Sagan Candle for IT Skepticism, goes to the anonymous "Marty" who - while we were all disappearing up our own philosophical orifices debating what is a customer and what is a service - brought us all back to earth with practical questions from the coal-face.

Comments

2011 awards

Thanks for this - It gave me much amusement over tea and toast this morning.
See you in Vegas - this year I intend enjoying myself more not having to sit exams.

Thanks for the grins

Skep (Rob)

Just wouldnt seem like a New Year without you and the sense of humor you bring to us all with these awards. Whatever happened to the "Mayan Optimists Trophy"?

Anyway, thanks Rob. See you in Vegas at Pink12. They have me presenting on the USMBOK!

Sense & sensibilities

Your sense of reality is delicious! Agree with Ian, given the significance of 2012 in the Mayan calendar would love an ITSM translation. Ta muchly for your shared sensibility!

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