PeopleCert calls it ITIL (Version 5), but Stephen Mann ran a LinkedIn poll to see what ITSM practitioners really call it, and the official name came in third. ITIL 5 took 41% of the vote, ITIL v5 pulled 26%, and the branded name only 22%. Stephen looks at why the shortcuts are winning, and why the official name probably won’t catch up.
Most teams still bolt security on at the end, then act surprised when the audit goes badly. Alex Harding makes the case for Security Stories, negative “what if” scenarios written from the attacker’s viewpoint and dropped straight into the backlog, so security gets designed in rather than retrofitted. A practical look at how the technique maps onto ITIL (Version 5) and where it fits into the design stage.
Somebody announces the death of service management every few years, and they’ve been doing it for 35 years now. Barclay Rae has heard every version and thinks they all miss the same thing: the job at the heart of service management is human, not technological. That’s why no new wave of tech has managed to kill it, and AI has made the case for it stronger.
Every few years, the IT industry settles on a new savior. Agile. Then DevOps. Now AI. Kaimar Karu argues organizations adopt each one without first knowing what they want from it, then act surprised when results don’t live up to the hype. In this episode of Roman Jouravlev’s Conversations with Giants series, Kaimar covers why AI should never be the goal in itself and the skills technology won’t replace.
Value is what the customer decides it is, not what the IT department or a framework says. It’s the test Stuart Rance has applied across a thirty-year career: would anyone on the receiving end say your work created value for them? In episode three of Conversations with Giants he explains why he hates tool replacement projects, and why using agentic AI to cut headcount is the wrong use of the technology.
When Askar Aituov joined as a Developer Experience consultant at one of Kazakhstan’s largest banks, with 700-plus engineers, he expected the usual challenges: stakeholder alignment, change resistance, legacy tooling. What he didn’t expect was to watch a mature ITIL 4 implementation quietly fail to deliver what it was supposed to. This article walks through what went wrong, and why.
For over 20 years, ITSM has repeated the same failures. Through the ABC cards, Paul Wilkinson has spent decades tracing how culture, leadership, and behavior consistently derail success, not tools or frameworks. AI is now the latest shiny thing being sold to organizations that haven’t fixed the underlying pattern. This article looks at why the industry still hasn’t learned, and what it would take.
What happened to ITSM evangelists? Explore why they disappeared, the value they brought, and why the ITSM industry needs them more than ever in 2026.
The release of the ITIL (Version 5) Foundation publication has brought new interest in what changed from ITIL 4. This article walks through 20 changes in ITIL (Version 5) compared to ITIL 4, including updates to the Value System, the new certification paths, AI governance, and how the framework now handles the practices practitioners already know.
Much changed in ITIL 4, and there’s a lot to get your head around. This article explains what the ITIL 4 service value system is and what it contains: the guiding principles, governance, service value chain, management practices, and continual improvement. It also covers how the SVS evolves in ITIL (Version 5) and what practitioners should watch for.
This article shares all 34 of the ITIL Version 5 management practices with their glossary definitions. Five of them have moved between ITIL 4 and ITIL (Version 5), now sitting in the product and service management practices grouping. The article walks through what moved, what it means, and how the shift affects practitioners working across the framework.
For ITSM teams that want to transition from documenting processes to creating process maps that deliver value, are trusted, and last the course, the starting point is treating them as more than just process maps. However, a robust process library requires the right “inputs” before it can drive the right “outputs.” All is explained here.
Where can you go to find a formal ITSM definition? And by formal, I mean one that you can quote without people taking issue with it, thanks to the nature of its source. This article looks at what’s available in 2026.
Akshay Anand, Lead Architect for the ITIL update, gives the lowdown on ITIL 4: the new service value system, the four dimensions, the updated guiding principles originally found in ITIL Practitioner, and the change from processes to practices. ITSM changed with ITIL 4, and it will continue to change. This article covers what practitioners still need to know.
A short primer on ITIL 4 and ITIL v5 for anyone getting up to speed quickly. From what it is to the key elements that comprise the latest ITIL 4 service management best practice guidance, this article covers what practitioners need to know to work with the framework, plus where to go for the deeper detail once the basics are in.