Information Technology Infrastructure Library (ITIL) – Should you use ITIL and become certified?

The Information Technology Infrastructure Library (ITIL) is a set of policies and procedures for best practice management of information technology (IT) infrastructure. Here is the official description from the governing body:

ITIL is best practice in IT Service Management, developed by OGC and supported by publications, qualifications and an international user group. ITIL is intended to assist organisations to develop a framework for IT Service Management. Worldwide, ITIL is the most widely used best practice for IT Service Management.

ITIL is the most widely accepted approach to IT service management in the world, with world class practices supported by quality services from a wide range of service providers, accredited training agencies, consultancies and professional qualifications. Users of ITIL are supported by exam and user group organizations that can support training and adoption of the methodology. The best-practice processes promoted in ITIL both support and are supported by the British Standards Institution’s Standard for IT Service Management (BS15000) and later ISO 20,000.

ITIL has become the industry standard for IT infrastructure best practices. ITIL does make sense to learn and become certified if you are an IT professional. The standards are what other project methodologies such as Microsoft Operations Framework (MOF) is based on so you may already have some familiarity. It just makes sense that when you are implementing process and procedures for IT infrastructure to use existing best practice standards instead of re-inventing the wheel. What are the best practices for media management? By becoming certified, this establishes you as a knowledgeable expert and raises your value to your organization. If you can become certified - I think it makes sense.

ITIL links:

http://www.itil-officialsite.com/home/home.asp

http://www.apmg-us.com/ITIL/ITILIntro.asp

http://www.itsmf.org/