New ITIL v3 certification scheme to be launched in UK

The new scheme for ITIL v3 certification will be launched at the itSMF conference in the UK this week. Prepared by Sharon Taylor it is the first time all the discussion has been drawn together into one paper.

The ITIL Diploma or Diploma in Service Management - which was to be near the top level certification for most ITIL professionals is now to be called the ITIL Expert.

That is about the only change for the much publicized and heavily criticized v3 certification program.

22 credits is the magic number to earn the ITIL Expert qualification.

Foundation earns 2 credits, each of the 5 Service Lifecycle programs is 3 credits, 4 for each of the Service Capability and 5 for the mandatory Managing across the Lifecycle.

The most annoying element of the program is still the amount of hours that each program is expected to take.

30 hours for Managing Across the Lifecycle
30 hours for each Service Capability course
21 hours for each of the Service Lifecycle courses
16.25 hours for the Foundation

So how does a training company decide how many days each course should be? It is even more complex when APMG haven't defined how many hours of contact time they consider a full traning day to contain.

Most people would say that a typical day involves 6.5 contact hours.
BUT APMG have said that the hours listed assume an 8 hour day... so now that is just plain silly...

Is a Foundation course expected to take two full days and then 15 minutes on the third... No, but equally would a vendor say that a Foundation is 2.5 days (assuming 6.6 hour days) ??

Why can't APMG just define this so that all ATOs have a common platform? My reason for why they cannot is that APMG are perhaps more interested in online study for each of the courses.

Maybe I am too cynical.... perhaps not!

EXIN - Knocks one out of the park!

Exin have released full details of their Service Quality Management track of programs. Terms such as SQMF, ITSMA, SQMA and how the program hangs together can now be explained.

The track is based predominantly around ISO 20000, but also recognizes the close connections to the ITIL framework.

First the program becomes a lot clearer when you remember that Exin - long time IT Service Management certification gurus have developed new programs that extend upon the long respected ITIL Framework. They have developed two programs in that area. IT Service Managment Foundation (ITSMF) and IT Service Management Advanced (ITSMA). The Exin programs focus beyond the theory of ITIL, by encouraging training vendors to consider implementation and application issues.

Then came ISO 20000 and EXIN recognized the logical flow on for ITIL into this international standard and developed two new programs.

Service Quality Management Foundation (SQMF), based on ISO 20000, but includes Terms and Vocabulary from ISO 9000. This program looks at the theory of ISO 20000 and until recently required a participant to have passed the IT Service Management Foudnation (ITSMF) exam - BUT in July 2007 this pre-requisite was removed.

Most recently Exin have launched the Service Quality Management Advanced (SQMA) program. This program does in fact have TWO pre-requisites. The Foundation Certificate in IT Service Management) AND the Service Quality Management Foundation (SQMF).

The syllabus of SQMA is designed to teach the "HOW" regarding the practical application of Quality Management, especially related to ISO/IEC 20000, and also on certification and auditing based upon ISO/IEC 20000. So while SQMF focuses on theory - which has to be learnt - the focus of the Advanced Certificate will be on managing, organizing, optimizing and evaluating quality systems based upon ISO/IEC 20000.

All in all the program is now a solid alternative for those people looking to lift themeselves beyond the ITIL theory and into a world of standards based Quality Management.

Guidance:

If you are currently ITIL Foundation certified (v2 or v3) learn the SQMF material and pass that exam. Then you can automatically qualify to take the SQMA course (as your ITIL Foundation certificate will be recognized as equivalent to the IT Service Management Foundation certificate.



If we look first at the Service Quality Management Advanced (SQMA) program then a lot of other programs can be explained.