ITIL V2 Vs ITIL V3

8/2/2019 ITIL V2 Vs ITIL V3

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ITIL V2 Vs ITIL V3

Sumit Kumar Jha

Page 1 of 7Consultant BSM (TIS), Wipro Technologies, Pune (India)

Like any other process framework evolution, ITIL is also evolving and ITIL V3 is the latest generation of this evolution. This evolution has really caused a

lot of anxiety in ITIL followers in terms of What it is?, How will it impact our ITIL V2 implementation?, Should we go for ITIL V2 or V3 and so on.

I would like to mathematically term V3 as:

ITIL V3 = ITIL V2 Refined + X

Where, X is a set of new processes, most of which probably your organization would already be following.

Also, there has been a level of ambiguity in the ITIL V2 jargons and the terms the industry was actually using. A best example of it can be the CMDB. The

ITIL V3 has not only taken care of these ambiguities but also provided a simplified framework in terms of what industry was actually using. In other words

we can say that it has refined ITIL V2 to be aligned with the industry. Not only that it has broadened its scope covering the processes that industry is

already using but were not included in ITIL V2.

Besides, while ITIL V2 talked about Aligning IT with business, the ITIL V3 is talking about integrating IT with business; i.e., making IT a part of the

strategic layer of an organization and thus covering strategic, tactical and operational layers.

ITIL V3 has introduced us to Service Life Cycle approach. This raises a question Why was it required? ITIL V3 is having a major focus on IT Strategy

(Business IT integration) and Continual Service Improvement. The entire approach from identifying a service for creating value to business, to its design,

transition, operation and improving on its performance and cost parameters needed a continuous cycle, and thus what we have is a Service Life Cycle.

Accordingly a process realignment (of all ITIL V2 processes) was required.

In the corresponding tables we would try to map all the existing processes of ITIL V2 to ITIL V3 and understand the key processes that are new to ITIL V3.The description under the column In V3 under has the names of core ITIL V3 books. These five books help an organization in understanding:

1. How can they developbusiness driven ITSM strategy?

2. How can they designa system to support the selected ITSM strategy?

3. How would they transitionthe designed system to production, in terms of people, processes and technology?

4. How would they support the operationof the implemented system on an ongoing basis?

5. How would they continuously improvethe processes and operations?


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ITIL V2 Vs ITIL V3

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Table 1: Mapping ITIL V2 processes to ITIL V3

S.No. Process Named In V3 As In V2 Under In V3 Under Additional Details

1. Financial ManagementFor IT Services

Financial Management ServiceDelivery

ServiceStrategy

Concept of Return on Investment (RoI) introduced.

2.Service Level

Management

Service Level

Management

Service

Delivery

Service

Design

No changes. Also covered briefly in Continual

Service Improvement.

3. Capacity Management Capacity ManagementService

Delivery

Service

Design

Resource Capacity Management is renamed as

Component Capacity Management (consisting of

Resource Management & Performance

Management).

Capacity Management Information System (CMIS

contains info. on capacity & performance reports

and data, Forecast and Capacity plan) introduced.

4. Availability Management Availability ManagementService

Delivery

Service

Design

Availability Management Information System

(AMIS contains info. on Availability Mgmt. reports,

Availability plan, Availability design criteria and

Availability testing schedule) introduced.

5. IT Service ContinuityManagement

IT Service ContinuityManagement

ServiceDelivery

ServiceDesign

No changes.

6. Change Management Change ManagementService

Support

Service

TransitionNo changes.


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ITIL V2 Vs ITIL V3

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7.Configuration

Management

Service Asset &

Configuration

Management

Service

Support

Service

Transition

Configuration Management and Asset

Management exist as two sub-processes.

Configuration Management System (CMS containsa set of tools and databases (Eg. CMDB, Asset

database, etc) used to manage configuration data

and includes information about Incidents,

Problems, Known Errors, Changes, and Releases)

introduced.

Service Knowledge Management System (SKMS)

introduced.

DHS & DSL replaced by Definitive Media Library

(DML is one or more locations in which the

definitive and approved versions of all software

Configuration Items are securely stored).

8. Release ManagementRelease & Deployment

Management

Service

Support

Service

Transition

Release and deployment activities separated as

two separate sub-processes Release and

Deployment.

9. Incident Management Incident Management ServiceSupport

ServiceOperation

No changes.

10. Problem Management Problem ManagementService

Support

Service

OperationNo changes.


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ITIL V2 Vs ITIL V3

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4. Supplier Management (Service Design):Supplier Management is the process responsible for ensuring that all contracts with suppliers support the

needs of the business, and that all suppliers meet their contractual commitments. In other words they are responsible to manage suppliers and the

services they supply, thus ensuring that value for money is obtained by provision of high quality of IT Services to the business.

Key Terminologies:

Supplier and Contract Database (SCD):It is a database or structured document used to manage Supplier Contracts throughout their lifecycle. The SCD

contains key attributes of all contracts with suppliers, and should be part of the Service Knowledge Management System.

5. Information Security Management (Service Design): It is the process that ensures the confidentiality, integrity, and availability of an organizations

assets, information, data, and IT Services. It is a comprehensive process designed to address the strategic direction for security activities of the

organization and to ensure that its business objectives are achieved. They are responsible for aligning IT Security with business security and thus

ensuring that information is effectively managed in all services and Service Management activities. In ITIL V2 it was a part of Availability Management.

6. Transition Planning & Support (Service Transition): Its purpose is to plan for the capacity & resources required for any transition and provide

support to the transition teams. Besides planning & co-ordination they are responsible for identifying, managing & controlling the risks of failure &

disruption across transition activities. When needed they also co-ordinate activities across projects, suppliers and service teams.

7. Service Validation & Testing (Service Transition): It is responsible for ensuring the quality assurance, i.e., to ensure that a service being

transitioned is fit for purpose and fi t for use. Its responsibility also includes planning and implementation of validation and test activities. It also identifies,

assesses and addresses issues, errors and risks through out the Service Transition activity.

8. Evaluation (Service Transition):It is a generic process. It considers whether the performance of something is acceptable, value for money, etc.

and whether it will be proceeded with, accepted into use, paid for, etc. They are responsible for correctly setting the stakeholder expectations and

providing effective and accurate information to Change Management to make sure changes that adversely affect service capability and introduce risk are

not transitioned unchecked.

9. Knowledge Management (Service Transition):It is responsible to ensure that the right information is delivered to the right person at the right time to

enable him/her to make an informed decision, thereby improving the quality of the management decision.


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10. Event Management (Service Operation):It is a stand-alone process for detecting and managing events and alarms, which ITIL calls exceptions.

In ITIL v2, Event Management was covered under Incident Management. It is responsible for monitoring all events that occur anywhere in the IT

infrastructure, to detect and escalate exception conditions and determine the appropriate control action.

11. Request Fulfillment (Service Operation):It is a new process for managing the lifecycle of all customer and user generated service requests. Thesetypes of requests include facilities, moves and supplies as well as those specific to IT services. In ITIL V2, it was covered under Incident Management.

12. Access Management (Service Operation): It provides rights and identity management related to granting authorized users the right to use a

service, while restricting access to non-authorized users. Its goalis to provide right to users to be able to use a service or group of services.

13. Continual Service Improvement:It is responsible for continuously aligning and re-aligning IT services to the changing business needs by identifying

the improvement opportunities and implementing the improvement plans/activities to IT services that supports the business processes.

ITIL Functions

ITIL V2 had Service Desk as the lone function. While ITIL V3 has 3 more functions other than the Service Desk. These functions are:

1. Technology Management: Provides the detailed technical skills and resources needed to support IT services and management, along with the ongoing

operation of the IT Infrastructure.

2. IT Operations Management: It is responsible for the daily operational activities needed to manage IT services and the IT Infrastructure. It includes IT

Operations Control and Facilities Management.

3. Application Management: It manages applications throughout their lifecycle.

Impact Of ITIL V3 On ITIL V2 Implementation

What if your organization is already implementing (or has already implemented) ITIL V2? In fact a very minimal impact is there. You can carry forward your

ITIL V2 implementation plans and once you have already implemented ITIL V2, you can identify the areas which would need some modifications or

tweaking of your processes. The changes to the old processes are in terms of refinements and thus are minimal. So taking your organization from ITIL V2


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ITIL V2 Vs ITIL V3

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to ITIL V3 is not going to be an uphill task. And in terms of the new processes of ITIL V3, a lot of them would be what your organization would already be

following. So you have to only work around these processes to follow the ITIL V3 framework.

And for the organizations that are thinking of implementing ITIL, well you can take up your implementation plan with ITIL V3 straight away.

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ITIL V2 Vs ITIL V3