Due Dilligence?

Are we doing all we can to meet the needs and understanding of ITIL for our clients? I have to ask this now, after attending the itSMF Fusion event in Dallas this past week. The presentations were, in my opinion, better than previous years. We're seeing a lot of progress in applying ITIL concepts in the real world. But I am concerned that our training is not keeping pace. The reason? I overheard someone behind me in one of the sessions complaining that you can't do what the speaker was suggesting. He commented that change is not involved 'that' early in the process. Now I have no way of knowing if this individual had completed Foundations training. But I know, given the context of the topic of the presentation, this gentleman was wrong. He had a short-sighted understanding of the scope of Change Management.

Why does this concern me? As consultants, we work with customers to help them adopt ITSM concepts as documented by ITIL to drive improvement in their operations. ITIL cannot be force-fed. If our clients are not being trained properly, we, as consultants, have to deal with their lack of knowledge, lack of understanding WHILE WE'RE TRYING TO HELP THEM IMPLEMENT SERVICE MANAGEMENT! There are enough challenges in any ITSM effort without having to deal with educating our clients in the basics of Service Management as espoused by ITIL. It is both a distraction and an additional expense.

I made a point to raise this concern this past week with those leaders in ITIL who DO care. I did this simply because if one assembles a group of people to drive improvement one should expect that if those people have a specific level of qualification, they understand the basics. I recognize it is our job to help clients incorporate these concepts into a practical framework for implementation and in doing that we have to help them fully understand the key concepts. But if the basics are missing, or worse, if the basics were not addressed properly to begin with, some individuals fill the gap with their own interpretation(s). Once they integrate this in their minds, it becomes a barrier to being open and understanding the real facts. In a consulting situation it presents challenges, barriers, and possible embarrassment for the customer (imagine a workshop in which a key manager makes a statement that everyone else in the room knows is in direct conflict with the fundamental principles of a process!). It adds a level of complexity that may derail the entire service management initiative.

I find those individuals who received their certification through on-line training to have the greatest problem in understanding the concepts. They may pass the exam. But quite frankly, how valuable is the certification, really? If they don't fully understand the full scope of the concepts - an impossible expectation of on-line training - they are only making incremental progress in being good stewards of their company's processes.

One of the principles I offer to my clients is to use the same training organization for all of their training. That, at least, provides some level of assurance of consistency. In dealing with change, there are enough variable with which to contend without being concerned that "ITIL 101" is compromised.