APMG finally let us in on ITIL Certification thinking

This article has been podcast

kimono I knew I should have held this month's newsletter a few days. The moment it is published with another tirade about the lack of support information and direction in ITIL certification, APMG finally open the kimono.

The key points of the announcement are, for me:

  • Three level structure for qualifications: foundation, managers/practitioner, and advanced (presumably = Masters)
  • requirement for bridging qualifications as previously inferred here, now confirmed
  • "Sharon Taylor presented their proposals to the Qualifications Board at a meeting on April 2nd". We waited a month to be allowed to share it! yet more secrecy and lack of consultation/participation for the user base.
  • Trainers will be "briefed on the difference between v2 and v3", but still zero guidance on how they should be behaving now. Still no governance, no responsibility for the welfare of the end user community

So what do we have? Month-old confirmation of the scraps of info that had leaked out or been guessed previously as to content, rules and timeframes. Still no direction or gudance for how the industry should be conducting itself right now and what consumers should expect.

if APMG want to be thought of as more than a commercial overhead layer they need to stand up and take some control.

And if OGC want to remain the rightful owners of ITIL they need to come out of the castle and do a little ruling: make APMG do it.

And - really stretching here - itSMF might actually act to represent their members and demand that APMG do it.

Comments

nothing readers didn't already know from the IT Skeptic

Thanks Angus

I'm happy to say there is nothing readers didn't already know from the IT Skeptic, except the number of credits (22) which I didn't quote becuase I assumed it would be tweaked often before the final version.

All v2 qualifications lead thru v3 bridge!

Hi

Quick look at new scheme and math implies the following:

1) If you hold a v2 Foundation certificate you can only gain 21.5 points by continuing a v2 path to the diploma - so you will have to take the .5 point Foundation bridge

2) If you are a current ITIL Service Manager (v2) you now have 16.5 points (v2 Foundation + Service Manager, the v2 Manager bridging class gets you to 21.5 (!) So again you need to go back and take the Foundation v3 bridging class ?

3) No extra credit for having gained a v2 Service Manager with distinction.

4) No credit for being a v2 approved instructor....

5) No credit for actually having achieved any work success or other education history

6) No support of continuing education credits

7) Too much credit for v2 practitioner cluster (?) - again v2 Foundation (1.5) plus 4 x v2 practitioner (15) plus managing lifecycle (5) = 21.5 again!

8) How do new clustered practitioner (P&R etc) line up with old? Where is Transition?

9) Will Manager bridge include any exam?

10) If you are just beginning in ITIL it might imply an expensive rout to the Diploma: ITIL V3 ($2k), 4 x Capability at @$2k each, or 5 x Lifecycle at $2k, plus managing Lifecycle ($1.5k), = $10-13k???? and how many days over how many years?

Hmmm...

ITIL V3 Training

Hi IT Sceptic

I have been following your recent stuff on ITIL V3. Just wanted to let you know that things are moving a bit faster than you thought. The first pilot ITIL V3 course has already taken place - you might want to show a photograph of the HP course held this week in Palo Alto? A good time was had by all and we are off and running! I know that many other course providers also have courses planned or underway.

By the way, there are some very good reasons that some projects/organisations may wish to continue using ITIL V2 training for a while at least - and all of the three examination boards and many of the course providers will offer these as a transition path for some months to come while the rest of the new V3 training programme is gradually rolled-out.

The V3 qualifications are intended to reflect the fact that IT Service Management has gradually matured over the 15 years since the first qualifications were first offered - and more exhaustive training/qualifications are needed to reflect and support this.

I enjoy some of your rants, and at my advanced age it is difficult not to be sceptical either, but the odd fact now and again might be refreshing?

David Wheeldon

Bloom's taxonomy

David -

Thanks for the refreshing comments. I'm looking forward to hearing you speak during the world tour.

I notice the training structure is based on Bloom's taxonomy. Very nice touch.

Dool

David - Hi its Ian - hope to

David - Hi its Ian - hope to sit on a panel with you soon to pick up what is always a fun conversation about ITSM and ITIL. This thread confuses me so in that it seems you claim HP has ALREADY run a 'pilot' V3 class. Well I am of course disadvantaged because we are a US company and accredited through ISEB. The last I heard the syllabus was released for the Foundation recently under NON-DISCLOSURE to us as an accredited training organization. Just so we are clear that was April 20th 2007. We have only just been told we can submit for V3 accreditation - today. How it is that HP can run a pilot? Was this under an APMG pilot program?

If its just from guesswork and the scoping document of June 2006 I suppose we can claim to have been running a pilot V3 Foundation class for many, many years.... hmmm. I hope we have a level playing field here...

looking forward to the tool blitzkrieg..

I think the pending 'V3 compatible' tool blitzkrieg (see Service Lifecycle Solutions: The Blood's in the Water) will be much more interesting, fun and may cost folks a lot more than training dollars....I agree itSMF should have stood up, and that OGC simply should have insisted on more disclosure sooner, but so it is...the value in V2 (or V3 for that matter) is in applying the knowledge anyway...future certs might include a way to measure some scars, as in 'I won't do THAT again'....

John M. Worthington
MyServiceMonitor, LLC

Reply

Hi Ian (and IT Sceptic)

Nice to hear from you. The field is indeed level so far as I know. All examination boards have agreed a 11th June start date for formal qualifications - and our first batch of people will be sitting the examinations then - we sought and were given permission to run an internal trial of our TTT material in advance to ensure all was OK by the go live date. I see from Pink's material that they are doing the same in a week or two's time - may be others are doing so as well? Adequate testing is a key part of any project don't you think? I am trying hard to concentrate on getting our material ready and not so much on what others have planned.

The reason I was prompted to send my original message that I was aware that there has been one heck of a lot of hard work being done in the background which is not always visible - for perfectly good reasons - and I did not want everyone to get too far ahead with the 'conspiracy theories'.

I like this IT Sceptic guy, being a sceptic myself - but you have to keep a sense of fairness and proportion as well don't you think? An earlier IT Sceptic blogg made some references to HP's FAQs which we have widely circulated to try and keep our customers and anyone else that is interested informed, at least from our perspective - but then it is suggested we are 'secretive' - cannot have it both ways?

Anyway I hope that you continue to thrive and that the whole ITIL based-industry can soon get fully underway again with the official launch of V3 in London on June 5th. I will be there along with the rest of the authors. If you or anyone alse who is interested can make this or any of the other dates scheduled over the following weeks it would be nice to catch up. I hope IT Sceptic can get to one of these - would be nice to meet!

Best Regards

David Wheeldon

A post has been removed here

A post has been removed here as unsubstantiated allegations

Hi David And thankyou for

Hi David

And thankyou for replying - this is indeed a busy time.

The organisation that is secretive is OGC (and now APMG). I think Pink and HP and others do an OK job of communicating within the scope of the NDAs that OGC wrap you up in. I have not suggested that HP is secretive and if that is the implication I apologise - it was never intended.

You announced the pilot as if we should relax because it is going on (and said that this blog is deficient in facts), but APMG has not bothered until now to make the pilots public or provide any other progress reports, so no wonder we are all getting a bit stressed.

Sometimes there are good reasons for not making things visible. Other times the reason is just lousy communications or excessive secrecy. Why did we wait a month for APMG's latest update? Why not give progress reports? When burning issues are out in the community why not address them? Where is the official forum where users could ask the questions and get them answered?

Two huge questions are buzzing around the forums unaddressed:
- under what terms should ATOs be offering V2 training right now?
- what will be the status of V2 certifications in a V3 framework?

We have partial answers to the latter and none to the former.

BTW, any time you feel this blog is deficient or incorrect in its facts, feel free to share the correct ones with us.

Some Customers decide to stick with ITIL v2

All this V3 stuff is great, but I have customers that do not really care... They want their staff trained in V2, because that is what the rest of the organization knows (common language). If it ain't broke don't fix it.
So happily providing that training and consulting of course:

BUT have you tried to order the ITIL V2 books lately: out of stock, backorder, etc... so my guess is it is not only the training issue, but also how long will the V2 books be available... but maybe is missed some message regarding that on an obscure website.

and I do not need the V2 books at this moment - I will check on ebay after V3 is actually published :-)

Regards
Peter Lijnse

Common sense not hysteria is the order of the day!

ITIL Version 3 represents the current and future thinking of real ITSM implementations in the industry. I am already seeing organisations ask HOW to extend their existing implementations and leverage ITIL V3 processes.

Several practitioners are excited from the initial “authorized” presentations that describe and extend the ITSM practices they are delivering today – i.e. the linkage of alerts to events to incident to proactive problem management and the linkage to self help and knowledge – find that linkage in V2 yet it is the realistic implementation that forward thinking organisations have leveraged. Not to mention the service catalogue….

There is no conspiracy theory here in terms of the book availability or even training, in fact ITIL V2 will remain available until some time in 2008. Like any upgrade in our industry there is a “drop support” date and should a user or in this case a practitioner wish to continue with existing guidance, they can, they will simply remain in an “unsupported mode”.

Common sense not hysteria is the order of the day!

could both have been done better

I don't think this site has much hysteria.
We will address the lifecycle of Version 2 in a future post. The main issues here are the governance of the industry during this transition period, and the public's involvement in the process of releasing Version 3. I think a common sense study of the facts shows they could both have been done better.

P.S. I hope she finds the paua shoulder-bag

the parties most deficient in facts are the OGC, APMG and itSMF

Hello David

Thank-you for joining in.

I agree there are excellent reasons why people might choose V2 training: I simply want that to be an informed choice. There is information to indicate that this is not happening. The cause of that is a failure of governance by the above parties.

I think they are most deficient in facts: the OGC, APMG and the itSMF. Yesterday's APMG news release was a month old and nowhere did it mention pilot courses, so please don't accuse me of being deficient in facts. I am going out of my way try to GET the facts for my readers and I welcome your contribution. I would love to post something on HP's course if I could find some public information about it...?

itSMF-USA might do something

itSMF seems totally under the thumb of the s l o w - moving Brits.

More to your point about itSMF - itSMF - USA, where the bulk of the money comes from, might see fit to represent their members. Otherwise, what, precisely, is their purpose? Why would the USA support a British standard?

the itSMF's function is NOT to represent its members

USA is about the only country in the world still supporting the British standard of imperial measurement so why not one more? :-D ITIL says a gram of prevention is worth a kilogram of cure.

It is that not-invented-here mentality that left USA behind in the ITIL stakes for a decade. A fair amount of useful invention actually happens in the remaining two-thirds of the world's economy. And a proportion of the authors are North American so I don't think ITIL can be called "British" any more - if it ever was.

As for the itSMF's function it is NOT, repeat NOT, to represent its members - and never has been.

The IT Service Management Forum (itSMF) is a global, independent, internationally recognized not-for-profit organisation dedicated to IT Service Management. itSMF is wholly owned and principally run by its membership. It consists of a growing number of national chapters, each with a large degree of autonomy but adhering to a common code of conduct.

The itSMF is a major influence on, and contributor to, industry best practices and Standards worldwide, working in partnership with a wide range of governmental and standards bodies worldwide.

Nothing there about representation. Seek in vain.

The itSMF exists in theory to promote ITSM and in practice to promote ITIL. Members are a source of funding not a reason for existence, which explains an awful lot about the way we are treated.

Syndicate content