The IT Infrastructure Library www.itil.co.uk
I have an analogy for CMDB - it is like a Swiss bank account. Allow me to paraphrase some of the conversations I've had around CMDB:
Pondering my recent (second) visit to Las Vegas, it is interesting the parallels and lessons about ITIL we can draw from the place.
The first is excess. Nobody can accuse the Las Vegans of being constrained by good taste or in fact by anything other than available funds. The motto of Las Vegas appears to be "nothing exceeds like excess". It is like super-size American food portions: I think the objective is for somebody to one-day eat a meal larger than their own head.
A recurrent theme in conversations I have had here at the Pink Elephant ITSM Conference is how resources such as ITIL or related tools have no value or relevance until you understand your organisation's own context for them.
We go round this question every week on LinkedIn. My answer is getting pretty well honed.
For all those who have paid lots of money to be accredited ITIL V3 training organisations (ATOs), be aware that APMG-International the Examination institute (EI) - as compared to their parent APMG Group the official OGC accreditor of all EIs - is not directing any business your way if you accredited through another EI. You know who your friends are in the ITIL world.
It seems Technical Service Catalogue is often misunderstood to mean a catalogue of different services from those in the Business Service Catalogue. It's not. It is a different view of the same services. ITIL SD 4.1.4 sadly refers to "supporting services, shared services" within the TSC which I think contributes to the confusion, but diagram 4.3 makes it clear - the services are the same in both, just the perspective and detail differ because of the different audiences: internal and external.
During two ITSM consulting engagements recently, I was reminded of a fundamental fact about ITIL – it works.
We stridently criticise ITIL – few more than me – because we want it to be better, and there is room for that, but we would not waste the breath and effort if it was not worth it. ITIL works. It is a useful tool.
It seems to me that the technoid's obsession with over-analysing and chasing perfection - what I call ETF: Excessive Technical Fastidiousness - is often applied to the definition of services.
Made in New Zealand 
