'PolITILical correctness gone crazy'...?

'Things aint what they used to be'...

So much debate these days about how technology has ruined our social skills, and how today’s teenagers don’t know how to run an executive dinner party, and how global warming is affecting our work/life balance, Twitter is damaging the eco-system and political correctness isn’t what it used to be.

I suspect we’re no different to previous generations in terms of how we view the world changing and how ‘things ain't what they used to be’ etc. There’s no doubt that we continue to do stupid things to ourselves and our planet, but again I’d rather be alive now than many unpleasant and unjust times in the past.

However, back in the micro-climate that is ITSM, one thing that has struck me in the last few years is simply this;

We seem to have created a bit of a monster, where everything is far more complicated than it needs to be. Around this monster there have also emerged a number of myths and legends and ‘thought leadership’ forums that need to be constantly fed and developed. In many cases the original ideas and truths around service management have become blurred and clouded by all the hype.

I have never been a fan of the over-expansion and over-exploitation of ITIL, and I really wanted V3 to condense into 1 slim volume rather than go up to 5 and more. Like many people I’ve gone along with this re-growth as V3 has really spoken to a whole new audience and other parts of IT and business. I also know and welcome the concept of the ‘broad church’ so there will be many different individual views and publications to match. However I do feel that the real essence and clarity of ideas now is often lost, plus the scale, machinery and over commercialization of the education program have all detracted from the real goals

There are some great ideas in v3 and I know many great people who have been involved with its creation, however I don’t still understand why we couldn’t have produced something really simple and memorable, that is actually used.

So, when I was discussing Service Catalog, service definition and design the other day I was then asked more about why the approach I proposed seemed to follow more of a ‘v2 rather than v3 approach’, and ‘oh why had I chosen to do this?’ Its not that I mind the question, its just that usually this is seen as more important than trying to piece together a workable service ‘supply chain’.

Regularly when discussing Service Catalog (which is in its implementation still a relatively new topic) I get asked about my opinion and strategy around portfolio and demand management. I know from the responses to my answers that these questions are generally asked without the remotest idea about what these things are or how they might be used in that organization.

Again I don’t mind and of course will be there to help and provide advice, but it seems that many people who are now ‘ITIL experts’ actually don’t know much or don’t have much real experience in doing ITSM...

Anyway ... Let's keep hold of the good stuff

To me what is important to grasp is the real shift in thinking from SYSTEM to SERVICE – and all that that implies. Service Catalog to me is the key to drive this and, once you start down the path of working through the IT ‘supply chain’, you are hooked into the quest to build both the catalog and the service delivery capability to meet it.

To me whether you use a version 2, 3 or 8.1.5 approach is irrelevant, what’s important is that you are building an understanding of your customers needs – from their perspective as well as IT’s – and then making sure that IT is set up to deliver it.

‘Political Correctness’ is often a misused and misunderstood concept – seen as being modern liberal-minded thinking applied in absurdum to simple and basic ideas. But mostly it’s right and based on solid principles – no one sensible would agree that it is OK to use an old racist term, even if its not ‘meant badly’.

However it’s often when these ideas are taken to extremes - and the original kernel of good sense transformed into something that it plainly is not – that people then rail against the whole concept of doing things properly. That’s what I see happening with ITIL and I hope we can resist it and hang on to the good stuff.