What is ITIL? Everything you need to know

Business and technology are linked in today’s day and age. In order to stay competitive, a company needs to be able to evolve both its corporate objectives and IT capabilities, no matter how painful or awkward this process may be.

This kind of change cannot be implemented with a blank canvas. Developing the IT services should always be driven with care and awareness of the processes and the practices of management in an organisation. Without this, an IT Service Management (ITSM) process will inevitably waste time, money and effort, giving competitors a chance to lure customers away with more efficient offerings.

Split over several levels and modules, ITIL covers everything from service strategies to continuous improvement, enabling practitioners to not only adapt IT service infrastructures, but also prepare for further changes down the line. This can help to foster sustainable productivity for businesses and create a better, more consistent experience for customers.

Since the late 1980s, the ITIL practices have become highly renowned, with tens of thousands of practitioners becoming certified around the world. It is now owned by AXELOS, a joint venture created by the Cabinet Office in 2013.

What is ITIL?

The ‘Information Technology Infrastructure Library’ is a complete set of best practices that are great for creating and improving the ITSM process. It is designed to help businesses manage risks, strengthen customer relations, establish cost-effective practices and build stable IT environments for growth, scale and change. In short, if you are somebody who is proficient in ITIL, you are an expert in continually shaping and improving the IT service development processes.

One of the biggest advantages of ITIL is the amount of versatility that it shows. The practices that it offers are flexible and scalable at the same time and allows organisations to use only what is needed. ITIL can also work better with other practices such as COBIT, SIX SIGMA and TOGAF.

An important thing to keep in mind is that ITIL is not built around a specific business model. Rather, it is based on the collective experience of IT professionals. It has been applied across multiple industries, helped mainly by the fact that virtually every industry in the world now relies on IT in one form or another.

How Does ITIL work?

The ITIL framework consists of five books, each one, focusing on a different element of the IT service lifecycle. They all support each other, providing practical guidelines for planning, instigating, and improving service or product development processes. These include;

• Service strategy
• Service design
• Service transition
• Service operations
• Continual service improvements

If you want to be a professional in ITIL you need to have the right qualifications so that you can become proficient. At Study365, we have an array of programmes that can help you. Here are some of them.

ITIL® 4 FOUNDATION OFFICIAL CERTIFICATION

This course is set to educate you on the ITIL approach to service management, which is a widely recognised and highly demanded skill in the modern ITSM world. Bound with a wealth of information, this course is ideal for IT managers, IT consultants, IT developers or business managers who wish to make some progress in their respective careers.

The course has sufficiently covered topics such as the key concepts of service management, the ITIL guiding principles, the four dimensions of service management and many more. You will also come to learn the purpose of ITIL service value system in deriving value through services and the key terms of the 15 ITIL practices.

This program will assess you through the official ITIL4® foundation exam at the end, which will evaluate your knowledge in applying the principles of ITIL in service management. The exam will also test your knowledge on the key concepts, elements, and terminology in ITIL and on the emerging practices such as Lean, Agile and DevOps.

This certificate will greatly supplement your qualifications and will help you land a rewarding employment in the IT service management industry. You can also use the certificate to progress in your career by demanding a higher pay or other job incentives from your employer. Below mentioned are some of the jobs this certificate will benefit you in, along with the average UK salary per annum according to https://www.payscale.com/career-path-planner,

• IT Manager – £38,778 per annum
• Project Manager, IT – £42,157 per annum
• Service Delivery Manager – £40,819 per annum
• IT Director – £77,982 per annum
• Senior Project Manager, IT – £59,208 per annum

ITIL® INTERMEDIATE: SERVICE STRATEGY (SS) OFFICIAL EXAM

This exam calls out for all individuals aspiring to get into or already working in the IT management or architecture. This esteemed qualification will manifest your knowledge and skills in service strategy and will open up various job and progression opportunities for you within the industry. This exam will test your knowledge on the service strategy phase of ITIL service lifecycle and the role of IT in achieving customer and business related objectives.

Taking this exam through Study365 is much cheaper and comes with vouchers for the ITIL service strategy exam. All you need to take this exam is a certificate in ITIL foundation exam and a certificate in service strategy lifecycle, and be the proud owner of a highly recognised qualification at our limited time discount prices. With this certificate in your resume, you can successfully demonstrate your expertise in service strategy to design, develop and implement service provider strategy in line with the organisational strategy.

Once you successfully complete ITIL Intermediate – Service Strategy you will be qualified to work in the following positions. The ITIL Intermediate – Service Strategy qualification will also put you in line to demand a higher salary or job promotion. The average UK salary per annum according to https://www.payscale.com/career-path-planner is given below.

• IT Operations Manager – (average UK yearly salary: £45,428)
• IT Security Manager – (average UK yearly salary: £50,473)
• Business Continuity Manager – (average UK yearly salary: £45,959)
• IT Team Leader – (average UK yearly salary: £35,710)
• IT Architect – (average UK yearly salary: £59,270)

Other Jobs you can get

• IT Planners
• IT Audit Manager
• Service Designers

ITIL® PRACTITIONER OFFICIAL EXAM

This official exam certificate might improve your eligibility for a range of jobs in the IT industry. It mainly tests your knowledge on the concepts of service management, implementing service management approach, guiding principles of ITIL practitioner, organisational change management and on effective communication within an organisation.

This exam certificate will showcase your knowledge on service management, change management, communication, metrics and measurement to the interested parties. This official exam certificate is internationally recognised and is accredited to a training organisation. After taking this exam in service offerings and agreements, you can go on to take the proceeding exams in ITIL to add up to your qualifications.

Once you successfully complete ITIL Practitioner you will be qualified to work in the following positions. The ITIL Practitioner qualification will also put you in line to demand a higher salary or job promotion. The average UK salary per annum according to https://www.payscale.com/career-path-planner is given below.

• IT Manager – (average UK yearly salary: £38,754)
• IT Consultant- (average UK yearly salary: £39,977)
• IT Architect – (average UK yearly salary: ££59,270)
• Business Analyst – (average UK yearly salary: £35,762)
• IT Project Manager – (average UK yearly salary: £42,074)
• IT Team Leader – (average UK yearly salary: £35,710)

The ITIL Certification Path

An important advantage that ITIL has over the competition is its certification path. As a student you can start with the ITIL Foundation (2 credits) which is also an entry level qualification that will provide you with an introduction to the ITIL framework, the purpose of it and the main processes.

Following this, you can choose to take the intermediate modules in any order that you like and depending upon the relevance that it has to your work. For ITIL V3 these modules consist of;

• Service Strategy (SS) – 2 credits
• Service Design (SD) – 3 credits
• Service Transition (ST) – 3 credits
• Service Operation (SO) – 3 credits
• Continual Service Improvement (CSI) – 3 credits
• Operational Support & Analysis (OSA) – 4 credits
• Planning, Protection & Optimisation (PPO) – 4 credits
• Release, Control & Validation (RCV) – 4 credits
• Service Offerings & Agreements (SOA) – 4 credits

Once you have gathered these 17 credits, and complete your intermediate modules, you can then move on to the ITIL Practitioner programme after which you will earn the title of ITIL expert.

According to Indeed, the average salary for professionals with this certification can range from £30,000 – £65,000.

Even though ITIL 4 has been released the validity of the ITIL 3 qualifications will stay intact. If you already have the expert title you can opt to take the Managing Professional (MP) Transition module so that you can upgrade the knowledge that you already have to suit the latest standards of the ITIL framework.

Now that you know about ITIL, are you interested? Then why not join our range of programmes and start your complete ITIL education with us? You can contact [email protected] for more information.