Is ITIL Dead in the Water?

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[Updated: mention of COBIT]

In five years time most organisations will consider ISO/IEC 20000 certification as a normal part of operating: a minimum benchmark. The horse has bolted with ISO/IEC 20000: the world sees it as “the ITIL standard” but OGC and itSMF have zero control of it.

ITIL 3, the “ITIL Refresh” is on its way. Like a Windows release it has been coming for a while, but we are assured it will be here soon. One issue with ITIL that we will examine in an upcoming blog is its rigidity: the revisions are few and far between. So ITIL can fall a little behind current thinking. ITIL 3 is positioned thus:

ITIL was last updated in 2000. Our overwhelming driver for this refresh is to keep the guidance up-to-date such that ITIL continues to be 'fit for purpose' as the most widely accepted approach to IT service management in the world.

It may (just "may") be a case of too little too late. People are taking a broader perspective than ITIL: it is beginning to look a little narrow when compared to CoBIT or ISO/IEC 20000.

ISO900x was the biggest load of crap ever foisted on the business community, but who would think of not being ISO900x certified in most business circles? In five years time most organisations will consider ISO/IEC 20000 certification as a normal part of operating: a minimum benchmark.

ITIL3 will not be ISO/IEC 20000-compliant: there is much new territory in ISO/IEC 20000. ITIL 3 is taking at least six years. How long would an ITIL/20000 take, even if OGC choose to do one?

The horse has bolted with ISO/IEC 20000: the world sees it as “the ITIL standard” but OGC and itSMF have zero control of it. All we need is for someone credible (and probably American: they have the resources to do it quickly) to publish and certify ISO/IEC 20000-based guidance, and ITIL is stone dead.

Think about it: a set of books like the ITIL books but exactly aligned with ISO/IEC 20000. That means a more complete scope than ITIL, and it means an absolute ISO standard to back it up and certify against. And there would be good upward compatibility for existing ITIL shops. Who wouldn’t go with it once the pressure to be ISO/IEC 20000-compliant ramps up?

Maybe the centre of the Service Management universe will move to the USA... Will we see [shudder] MOF/20k ...

[Updated:] Another strong contender to displace ITIL is COBIT, which is growing to be as meaty a body of knowledge as ITIL but across a wider range of IT. Not ISO20000 compliant ... yet.

See also:

  • Is ITIL still dead in the water?
  • COBIT rivals ITIL
  • Will ISO9000 absorb or displace ITIL?
  • Today’s shock joint announcement from Microsoft and IBM (for a laugh)
  • Comments

    Update please...

    and now more than a year later, do you still feel this way? is ITIL v3 dead? has ISO 20K started to take over? how many companies have become ISO 20K certified? i have heard that they are going to do a 'revision' of ISO 20K by 2008 or maybe 2009!? is this true? what does it mean?

    i have already emailed you from facebook a few other questions related to ISO 20K. maybe you can answer those too. with some updated view on ITIL and ISO 20K now that this december marks the 2 year birthday for ISO and nearly a year(? six months...when was it officially 'released'?) or so for v3.

    Wow...

    Now time really has gone by.

    Here we are 4 years after my last comment here. Almost to the day!

    Has ISO 20000 replaced ITIL? Not really.

    I did a poll this past summer on LinkedIn about this and the results were not overwhelming (granted, it also isn't very scientific) that people are even ISO 20000 aware.

    COBIT? Hasn't done much here in the US. Just do a job search. That is generally how I tell.

    ITIL looks like it is still "growing" but maybe it has already "jumped the shark" - I don't know.

    Has it reached its peak yet? I don't think ISO 20000 will be the 'thing' that replaces it.

    My reports of ITILs death are greatly exaggerated

    Sorry Stephen I recall I had good intentions about answering your last comment but clearly it got lost :(

    Back then I think it was too early to call but now clearly I was wrong. Or rather I was premature

    Expect to see some research from me soon that shows ITIL is still growing.

    I still think ISO 20000 will become a default, but it seems it suffers the same lag in the USA as anything else not invented there. Nor is it roaring ahead anywhere else, mind you. Maybe another 5 to 10 years eh?

    And I'm still backing COBIT to displace ITIL. Use it myself as my primary go-to framework. I'm working now with a client who independently came to the same conclusion.

    But I grossly underestimated ITIL's momentum. There are more than a million people certified, i think - I need to check that again) and I can see that going to two million maybe. They all want ROI on their training.

    ISO 20000 allows the scope to be too narrow

    I did a poll some time ago on LinkedIn (you may remember) that showed just under 40% of respondents cared if their provider was ISO 20000 certified, with a further 16% not even knowing what ISO 20000 was.

    http://linkd.in/mi123Z

    Now, clearly, any poll on LinkedIn isn't one of high scientific rigor. It is interesting though that nearly 200 people took the time to respond. Some percentage of that may have been mischievous. But taking in all that to account, and other external information (like, my informal poll walking around ITSMF Fusion last week) most people don't care about their provider being ISO 20000 and most people aren't interested in being ISO 20000 - UNLESS - it is needed to win business.

    And then, from what I've heard from people is that the vast majority of the time, what the provider has under scope isn't even what is being consumed by the customer. Essentially making the ISO 20000 certification useful only as a marketing tool.

    COBIT is interesting. If ITSMF was really about IT Service Management (and not about ITIL) why wouldn't there be any sessions or discussions about COBIT?

    ISACA and itSMF

    "If ITSMF was really about IT Service Management (and not about ITIL) why wouldn't there be any sessions or discussions about COBIT?" Now THERE's an interesting question. Charitably, part of it is because there is still remarkably little interest in COBIT. And the other part? Well...

    For four years I've been suggesting that ISACA and itSMF get together . I had hopes when Rob Stroud was on both Boards but so far there have been only a few token gestures that I have seen. I see no intention from either side. In Australia and New Zealand we have sometimes had booths at each other's conferences: ISACA were at the one in Perth recently. But the option is often not taken up, and that's hardly collaboration anyway. Why aren't we on the stage together?

    I reckon we should have joint Christmas* celebrations to get the relationship started.

    Of course itSMF are not going to do that. Even though itSMF members have more to gain (and learn) than ISACA by reaching out, I don't think itSMF want too many members looking over the fence to make comparisons, much like North Korea doesn't want anyone to know what the rest of the world is like.

    * I'm not allowed to call it Christmas in the Land of Political Correctness am I? Well I'm an atheist and I'm still not going to bend to that bit of milquetoast lunacy: Christmas Christmas Christmas Christmas Christmas Christmas Christmas Christmas Christmas Christmas Christmas Christmas Christmas Christmas Christmas Christmas

    itSMF and COBIT

    I've been to loads of sessions at itSMF events where COBIT is discussed and included. COBIT is a regularly used tool in our service management toolkit, along with ITIL, ISO20k, SFIA and many many others. There is mention of COBIT in some of the presentations planned for the itSMF UK conference in November, and I heard it mentioned at sessions at Fusion11 last week in Washington DC.

    some data

    Fusion11:
    Number of sessions: ~104
    Number with COBIT in the title: 1
    Number with ISO20000 in the title: 0

    itSMFUK 2011:
    Number of sessions with a title listed: ~44
    Number with COBIT in the title: 0
    Number with ISO20000 in the title: 1

    itSMF Aus 2011:
    Number of sessions: ~68
    Number with COBIT in the title: 1
    Number with ISO20000 in the title: 0

    Mentions of COBIT on the itSMFI website: ~1 (not counting individuals listing it as an interest)

    Mentions of COBIT on the itSMFUSA website: ~5

    Mentions of COBIT on the itSMFUK website: >4 (not counting individuals or book listings)

    =======================

    ISACA World Congress 2011:
    Number of sessions: ~40
    Number with ITIL in the title: 0
    Number with ISO20000 in the title: 0

    Mentions of ITIL on the ISACA website: 426 search hits (including a whole online group of members devoted to ITIL)

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