Education and Training issues - Part 1
I have been following a few exchanges about education in various social media environments lately. Most of them are great discussions. I am paying particular attention to those relating to IT, ITSM and ITIL. So far, it seems to me most participants in these exchanges (including myself) agree the ITIL literature and the ITIL certification do not cover everything. One of the most interesting discussion centers on soft skills and ITIL.
OGC and APMG are promoting ITIL, Project, Program, and Risk Management. It should not be expected of them to incorporate other well-defined framework and qualification into the mix. Others already do this. The scope of the complementary guidance in ITIL is for ITIL specific, specialized, and expanded literature and qualifications about ITIL topics. A great example is the Service Catalogue certification.
Conferences and trade-shows, blogs and webinars offer us *the educators and trainers) great platforms to push the envelope beyond “ITIL.”
There are no perfect frameworks or methodologies out there. You know this and I know this. A combination of the frameworks and methodologies will result in the industry shaping itself into what it should become.
It is my humble opinion that we agree something must be done. What we need is thought leadership and leadership to say enough is enough and tell organizations that additional activities (such as x, y, and z) need also be done. As I have mentioned in my blog a few times we, the ITIL education, consulting and vendor community) are doing ourselves a major disservice by insisting on calling everything IT-this and IT-that.
If you look at the five ITIL core books, they simply mention, and very briefly define, other frameworks and methodologies. Because of copyright issues and in order not to re-invent the proverbial wheel, the authors were instructed to mention only other frameworks and methodologies and their touch points.
In regards to the other frameworks and methodologies, such as CMMI, COBIT, PMI, PRINCE2, and SIX SIGMA, to name but a few, they all complement each other, as we all know. None of them is all-encompassing. Based on the readings that I do and the conversations that I have, I can safely say the other frameworks and methodologies suffer very similar issues such as perceived omissions in many areas especially soft skills.
What we are facing is attitude and contempt. People believe that cost cutting, outsourcing and asking personnel to work longer hours and to get the job done are the solutions. Wrong. Go to any bookstore and look at the self-help section. It is all about communication, self-awareness, and being at peace with the environment, oneself, and others. Go to the business section and you get so many books about corporate culture and business behaviors.
Then go the IT section and all you (mostly) see are technical books. There is very little about soft skills.
The issue s much bigger than we think. What we require is a major change in attitude by IT professionals and businesses in general.
There is no “one-size-fits-all” solution. However, I do believe that the more we push communication, including behavior and related skills; we will change the culture of IT eventually. It will be a long and arduous road.
I do agree that culture is a huge component of what we are faced with as instructors and consultants. One of the major obstacles to any of the above is that executives believe that you can simply plug it in, turn it on and voila!
POP quiz: what is one of the first items to be cut in tough economic times?
Answer: education and training.
Trainers must be careful not to thread outside the scope of the course syllabus. There is always a temptation to stray into exciting topics but they can distract the delegates (students) from their two primary objectives; acquiring knowledge and passing the exam. (NOTE: I understand that for many, the objectives are reversed and that acquiring new knowledge may be secondary or even irrelevant). If trainers spend too much time on other topics, such as “soft skills” during a class the students may complain the trainer did not prepare them adequately for the exam. However, the stories, the analogies, the examples and the additional “value-add” material were terrific and likely the best part of the course. By the way, I know first hand what it feels like as I made the above mistake a few times.
Organizations must incorporate soft skills education and training. However, they must first design, engineer and foster a corporate culture that will enable this to happen and empower the people to act on it.
To be continued…
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