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IT Best Practices: With Help from ITIL, Business Comes First
February 2007ITIL, the IT Infrastructure Library, entered the North American consciousness just in time to help shift the focus from putting technology first to putting business first. It's a change that amounts to a seismic jolt to the culture of insurance company IT departments.
The 30-odd volumes of ITIL, which are slated for an update next month, provide a common language for IT staffs and a framework for honing IT processes. For most insurers on these shores, the idea of ITIL gained significant momentum in 2004 and reached critical mass in 2005, IT people say.
Suddenly, external auditors expect answers to ITIL-related questions. Almost overnight, demand has swelled for consultants who tutor IT staff members for ITIL certification exams. For the first time, IT managers scan the resumes of prospective employees for ITIL credentials. ITIL has even entered the university curriculum.
On the other side of the Atlantic, however, ITIL seems anything but new. A government agency in the United Kingdom published the first version of ITIL in the '80s, basing at least some of the best practices on a set of books from IBM. Apparently, UK bureaucrats had tired of substandard work from contractors and were ready to dispense advice.
Their brainchild is sometimes misunderstood as an instruction manual for running an IT department, users say. The truths of ITIL work only when massaged to fit a particular company, according to the insurance IT people farthest along on their IT journeys.
"You have to fit it into your world and make it work for you," says Andy Abramczyk, manager of IT information services for Erie Insurance Group, Erie, Pa. His company began using ITIL in 2002.
Companies usually begin their ITIL initiative by calling in pros to teach classes. After completing a course, employees take exams for certification at the foundation, practitioner or master levels.
Once ITIL has been in place for a while, IT managers can rate progress on a scale of one to five. For many, Level 3 seems appropriate, because Levels 4 and 5 can cost too much to achieve.
A NEW IMMIGRANT
One of the most dramatic effects of ITIL has been its capacity to help IT departments shift their thinking.
Until recently, bands of IT techies came up with innovations and then tried to apply their handiwork to the company's needs. Now, those same teams strive to understand what the business side of the company needs and only then endeavor to figure out how technology can help accomplish it.
"We're all about services-not servers," says Pete Corrigan, assistant vice president of infrastructure services/data centers at Allstate Insurance Co., Northbrook, Ill. The service movement got under way there in 2003, just as ITIL was becoming a buzzword at the company, he says.
At State Farm Insurance, Bloomington, Ill., IT people began adopting ITIL-like best practices in the late '90s and launched their first official ITIL project in 2001, according to Sue Jensson, who serves there as component director with responsibility for service management. As with Allstate, State Farm IT people want to turn their attention to business.
"The thing that we're focused on is to enable that alignment to the business through our architecture efforts," says Jensson.
At Citizens Property Insurance Corp., which has headquarters in Tallahassee, Fla., ITIL became a factor in mid-2005. ITIL soon helped Citizens become yet another place where the IT focus changing from technology to business, says Robert Sellers, director of technology and infrastructure.
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