ITIL 4 Foundation Study Guide

Core Definitions

• • Service: a means of enabling value co-creation by facilitating outcomes customers want, without them managing specific costs and risks
• • Service Management: a set of specialized organizational capabilities for enabling value for customers in the form of services
• • Value: the perceived benefits, usefulness, and importance of something
• • Organization: a person or group with its own functions, responsibilities, and relationships
• • Outcome: a result for a stakeholder enabled by one or more outputs
• • Output: a tangible or intangible deliverable of an activity

Value Co-Creation

• • Value is co-created by the service provider AND the consumer
• • Utility: what the service does — "fit for purpose"
• • Warranty: how the service performs — "fit for use"
• • Both utility AND warranty are required for value

Service Relationships

• • Service Provider: creates and delivers services
• • Service Consumer: receives the service
• • Consumer roles: Customer (defines requirements), User (uses the service), Sponsor (authorizes budget)
• • Service relationships: provision, consumption, management

Costs, Risks, and Value

• • Costs removed from consumer (e.g., no need for own server team)
• • Costs imposed on consumer (e.g., subscription fees)
• • Risks removed from consumer (e.g., provider handles security)
• • Risks imposed on consumer (e.g., dependency on provider)

1. Focus on Value

• • Everything should link back to value for stakeholders
• • Understand who the consumer is and what they value
• • Consider customer experience (CX) and user experience (UX)

2. Start Where You Are

• • Assess the current state before changing anything
• • Use existing services, processes, and data where possible
• • Don't start from scratch without considering what's already available

3. Progress Iteratively with Feedback

• • Work in small manageable increments
• • Use feedback loops to improve each iteration
• • Minimum Viable Product (MVP) approach

4. Collaborate and Promote Visibility

• • Include the right stakeholders at the right time
• • Make work and progress visible to all involved
• • Poor visibility leads to poor decisions

5. Think and Work Holistically

• • No service or element works in isolation
• • Consider the end-to-end delivery of value
• • Integrate across all four dimensions

6. Keep It Simple and Practical

• • Use the minimum number of steps to accomplish an objective
• • Eliminate waste and complex processes
• • Start simple and add complexity only when needed

7. Optimize and Automate

• • Optimize human and technical resources
• • Automate where possible after optimization
• • Use technology to enhance efficiency (don't automate waste)

1. Organizations and People

• • Formal organizational structures: roles, responsibilities, authority
• • Culture: shared values, attitudes, trust, transparency
• • Skills and competencies needed across the organization
• • Communication and collaboration styles

2. Information and Technology

• • Information: knowledge management, data exchange, regulatory requirements
• • Technology: tools, platforms, cloud, AI, automation
• • Workflow management and communication systems
• • Consider: availability, capacity, security of information

3. Partners and Suppliers

• • Relationships with other organizations for service delivery
• • Service integration and management (SIAM)
• • Sourcing strategies: insource, outsource, single/multi-supplier
• • Contracts and agreements (underpinning contracts)

4. Value Streams and Processes

• • Value stream: series of steps to create and deliver products/services
• • Process: set of interrelated activities that transform inputs into outputs
• • Map value streams to identify waste and optimize flow
• • Align processes with value creation

SVS Components

• • Input: Opportunity/Demand
• • Output: Value
• • Components: Guiding Principles, Governance, Service Value Chain, Practices, Continual Improvement
• • Purpose: ensure the organization continually co-creates value

Service Value Chain (6 Activities)

• • Plan: shared understanding of vision, status, and direction
• • Improve: continual improvement across all areas
• • Engage: understand stakeholder needs, ensure transparency
• • Design & Transition: meet stakeholder expectations for quality, costs, time-to-market
• • Obtain/Build: ensure service components are available
• • Deliver & Support: deliver services to agreed specifications

Continual Improvement Model

1. What is the vision? (business vision, mission, goals)
2. Where are we now? (baseline assessment)
3. Where do we want to be? (measurable targets)
4. How do we get there? (improvement plan)
5. Take action (execute the plan)
6. Did we get there? (evaluate metrics)
7. How do we keep the momentum going?

Governance

• • Evaluate, Direct, and Monitor (EDM)
• • Ensures organizational activities are aligned with strategy
• • Governing body: accountability for compliance and performance

General Management Practices

Continual Improvement

• • Align practices with changing business needs
• • Uses the Continual Improvement Model (7 steps)
• • Continual Improvement Register (CIR): log and track improvement ideas
• • Everyone's responsibility, at all levels of the organization

Information Security Management

• • Protect information: confidentiality, integrity, availability (CIA)
• • Authentication, authorization, non-repudiation
• • Balance security controls with usability

Relationship Management

• • Establish and nurture links between organization and stakeholders
• • Identify, analyze, monitor stakeholder relationships

Supplier Management

• • Ensure suppliers and their performance are managed appropriately
• • Supplier evaluation, contract negotiation, performance tracking

Incident Management ⭐

• • Purpose: minimize negative impact by restoring normal service ASAP
• • Incident: unplanned interruption or reduction in quality
• • Swarming: collaborative approach for complex incidents
• • Major incidents: separate procedure, greater urgency
• • Log, classify, prioritize, diagnose, resolve, close

Problem Management ⭐

• • Purpose: reduce likelihood and impact of incidents by identifying root causes
• • Problem: cause or potential cause of one or more incidents
• • Known Error: problem with a documented root cause and workaround
• • Phases: Problem identification → Problem control → Error control
• • Known Error Database (KEDB): stores known errors and workarounds

Change Enablement ⭐

• • Purpose: maximize successful changes by proper assessment and authorization
• • Standard: pre-authorized, low-risk, well-understood
• • Normal: follow full change process, scheduled, assessed
• • Emergency: must be implemented ASAP, assessed post-implementation
• • Change Authority: person/group who authorizes changes
• • Change Schedule: calendar of planned changes

Service Level Management ⭐

• • Purpose: set clear business-based targets for service performance
• • SLA (Service Level Agreement): agreement between provider and customer
• • OLA (Operational Level Agreement): internal team agreements
• • Watermelon SLA: green on the outside (metrics met) but red inside (customer unhappy)
• • Service reviews, customer satisfaction surveys

Service Request Management

• • Purpose: support agreed quality by handling pre-defined user requests
• • Service Request: formal request for something pre-approved (password reset, access, info)
• • Should be standardized and automated where possible
• • Fulfillment through workflows and approvals

Service Desk ⭐

• • Purpose: capture demand for incident resolution and service requests
• • Single point of contact between provider and users
• • Types: local, centralized, virtual, follow-the-sun
• • Channels: phone, email, chat, portal, walk-in, social media
• • Empathy and emotional intelligence are key skills

IT Asset Management

• • Plan and manage the full lifecycle of IT assets
• • Maximize value, control costs, manage risks
• • Software asset management (SAM): license compliance

Monitoring and Event Management

• • Observe services and components systematically
• • Event: any state change significant for management
• • Event types: informational, warning, exception

Release Management

• • Make new and changed services available for use
• • Release: version deployed to live environment

Deployment Management

• • Move hardware, software, or other components to live environments
• • Deployment approaches: phased, big bang, continuous, pull
• • Distinct from Release Management (release = available, deploy = move)