Future of IT service management

As per WTO (World Trade Organization), services comprise the largest and most dynamic component of both developed and developing economies. Services are the main way that organizations create value for themselves and their customers. Almost all services today are IT-enabled, which means there is tremendous benefit for organizations in creating, expanding and improving their IT service management capability.

Technology is advancing at a greater pace than ever before. Developments such as cloud computing, infrastructure as a service, machine learning, and blockchain, have opened fresh opportunities for value creation, and led to IT becoming an important business driver and source of competitive advantage. In turn, this positions IT service management as a key strategic capability.

To ensure that they remain relevant and successful, many organizations are embarking on major transformational programs to exploit these opportunities. While these transformations are often referred to as 'digital', they are about more than technology. They are an evolution in the way an organization works, so that it can flourish in the face of significant and ongoing change. Organizations must balance the need for stability and predictability with the rising need for operational agility and increased velocity. Information and technology are becoming more thoroughly integrated with other organizational capabilities, silos are breaking down, and cross-functional teams are being utilized more widely. Service management is changing to address and support this organizational shift and ensure opportunities from new technologies, and new ways of working, are maximized.

Service management is evolving, and so is ITIL, the most adopted guidance on IT Service management (ITSM) in the world.

About AXELOS

AXELOS are a new joint venture company, created by the Cabinet Office on behalf of Her Majesty's Government (HMG) in the United Kingdom and Capita plc to run the Best Management Practice portfolio, including the ITIL® and PRINCE2® professional standards..

AXELOS (The Accreditor) assess and license Examination Institutes (EIs) to administer ITIL accreditation and examination activities

About ITIL  V 4.0

IT Infrastructure Library® (ITIL) is the most widely adopted framework for IT Service Management in the world. It is a practical approach to identifying, planning, delivering and supporting IT services to the business. It describes how IT resources should be organized to deliver business value, documenting the processes, functions and roles of IT Service Management (ITSM). ITIL 4 brings ITIL up to date by re-shaping much of the established ITSM practices in the wider context of customer experience, value streams, and digital transformation, as well as embracing new ways of working, such as Lean, Agile, and DevOps.

ITIL 4 provides the guidance organizations need to address new service management challenges and utilize the potential of modern technology. It is designed to ensure a flexible, coordinated and integrated system for the effective governance and management of IT-enabled services.

The key components of the ITIL 4 framework are the Service Value System and the Four Dimensions model. The service value system (SVS) represents how the various components and activities of the organization work together to facilitate value creation through IT-enabled services. These can be combined in a flexible way, which requires integration and coordination to keep the organization consistent. The SVS facilitates this integration and coordination and provides a strong, unified, value-focused direction for the organization. The structure of the SVS is shown in the following figure

The core components of the ITIL v4  SVS are:

• ITIL V4 Guiding principles Recommendations that can guide an organization in all circumstances, regardless of changes in its goals, strategies, type of work, or management structure.
• ITIL V4 Governance  Governance The means by which an organization is directed and controlled.
• ITIL V4 Service Value Chain A set of interconnected activities that an organization performs to deliver a valuable product or service to its consumers and to facilitate value realization.
•  ITIL management practices Sets of organizational resources designed for performing work or accomplishing an objective.
• Continual improvement A recurring organizational activity performed at all levels to ensure that an organization's performance continually meets stakeholders' expectations. ITIL 4 supports continual improvement with the ITIL continual improvement model.

To ensure a holistic approach to service management, ITIL 4 also outlines four dimensions of service management, from which each component of the SVS should be considered. The four dimensions are:

1. Organizations and people

2. Information and technology

3. Partners and suppliers

4. Value streams and processes.