About the recently announced ITIL books updates from OGC
Most of you probably know by now that the OGC has announced they will update the ITIL V3 books.
The updates will correct spelling and grammatical errors of course (and hopefully). The updates will also look at correcting inconsistencies between books where some statements in one book contradicts one in another book. In addition the structure for certain books will be adjusted. I am thinking of the CSI book where section 4.1 is about 14 pages long with no subsections. Then section 4.1suffers from the same illness and goes on for 8 pages. I know my Pink Elephant colleagues Gary and George wrote the book. This is an oversight. In their defence, the book was reviewed by over 50 people and this was not corrected. I am not here to pint fingers. Errors and mistakes happen.
I am actually delighted to hear about this revision. I just have a few concerns
1. Who are the people making the corrections?
2. Will they consult the original authors to ensure the revisions are consistent with the authors’ intentions?
3. How many errors, omissions and changes have been identified?
4. Will the reviewers add their own spin to the material?
5. Will the reviewers modify the material to what they believe should have been there in the first place?
6. Will the reviewers remove material they believe should not have been there in the first place?
7. Who is reviewing the change requests to ensure they are indeed valid and are best practices?
8. What is the target date for the new versions to be available to the public?
9. How will this affect the Qualification scheme and the exams?
10. Will the examiners be given enough lead time to amend the syllabuses and questions if necessary
11. Will there be sufficient time to test and pilot the revisions to the syllabuses and exams?
12. Will this in turn allow the accredited training organization (ATO) sufficient time to update their course material?
13. Will this affect the ITIL compatible tools on the market or about to hit the market?
14. Will there be regular communication updates from the parties involved to the IT community at large?
15. How will the revisions affect the translations for the glossaries and exams?
16. How will the revisions affect the mapping between ITIL and various other frameworks and methodologies?
17. How will this revision affect the complementary guidance books already published or being written presently?
By the way if you want to see the current request for changes for the ITIL v3 books, you can ego to the official ITIL website, sign up and view the requests. Just a word of warning, there are RFCs for other frameworks and methodologies as well so it takes a while to sort out the ITIL ones.
Please visit the Change Control System on the Official ITIL Website at:
OGC’s Change Control System link
Or you can thank your truly and download the attached spreadsheet that ONLY contains the ITIL related RFCs. Let me add here that if the OGC received requests and suggestions via other means such as email, I do not know if they are part of this list. This list is accurate as of Friday September 11.
RFC_log_for_all_ITIL_v3_publications.xls