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OCLC Systems & Services: International digital library perspectivesITIL: a framework for managing digital library services

Frank CervoneArticle in format ion:To cite this document:Frank Cervone, (2008),"ITIL: a framework for managing digital library services", OCLC Systems & Services:International digital library perspectives, Vol. 24 Iss 2 pp. 87 - 90Permanent link to this document:http://dx.doi.org/10.1108/10650750810875430

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Professor Zahir Irani, Norita Ahmad, Noha Tarek Amer, Faten Qutaifan, Azza Alhilali, (2013),"Technologyadoption model and a road map to successful implementation of ITIL", Journal of Enterprise InformationManagement, Vol. 26 Iss 5 pp. 553-576 http://dx.doi.org/10.1108/JEIM-07-2013-0041

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MANAGING DIGITAL LIBRARIES:THE VIEW FROM 30,000 FEET

ITIL: a framework for managingdigital library services

Frank Cervone Northwestern University, Evanston, Illinois, USA

AbstractPurpose – The purpose of this paper is to provide an overview of the Information TechnologyInfrastructure Library (ITIL) framework and its relevance to digital library projects and operations.Design/methodology/approach – This paper describes the ITIL framework.

Findings – The use of the ITIL has been pervasive in the corporate environment, particularly in theUK. With the release of version 3 of the library, the use of the library is expected to grow and expandinto newer areas, such as digital library infrastructure management.Originality/value – This paper lls a gap in the digital library management literature by exploringthe applicability of the ITIL framework as a means for more effectively developing and deliveringservices in IT organizations that support digital libraries.Keywords Communication technologies, Project management, Service levels, Digital libraries,Information operationsPaper type General review

It seems that no matter whom you talk to, everyone claims to use best practices. Whilemost people would consider this a good thing, the problem with best practices is that

discovering and implementing them is not always an obvious or easy task. Mostoperational areas, including information technology, have wrestled with this problemfor years. Many different methodologies and frameworks for optimizing the use of information technology have emerged over the course of the last 40 years or so, butmost of these appear to have fallen into historical obscurity. For example, does anyonestill use total quality management (TQM)? Or from an even more distant past,management by objectives (MBO)? Most people would say, “No, we’ve moved beyondthat.”

While it is true we have moved beyond explicitly thinking about TQM and MBO asdistinct methodologies today, neither has simply vanished from the face of the planeteither. What actually happened is that the most useful parts of the methodologies wereincorporated into our day to day practice. And then, one day, somewhat mysteriously,neither of them was something we “did” anymore. The good parts of TQM and MBO just became part of our everyday procedures, practices, and processes. This is one of the dilemmas of best practices: if they stand the test of time we get so used to usingthem and we forget about them as a distinct entity as the useful parts have just becomesecond nature.

It would seem that this cyclic pattern is not a barrier to our adoption of bestpractices. As this paper was being written, a quick search of Google indicated therewere approximately 39,600,000 results for “best practices.” Clearly, people are using

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perspectivesVol. 24 No. 2, 200

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1065-075XDOI 10.1108/1065075081087543

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best practices and apparently quite a number of them as well. The question hauntingmany technology managers is “How do we decide which best practices apply to us andour digital library projects?”

For many issues related to digital libraries, the answers are more obvious in someareas than in others. For example, when confronted with issues related to digitalrepositories and preservation planning, one can consult documents such as the “DraftDCC curation lifecycle model” (Higgins, 2007) or the Trustworthy Repositories Audit & Certication (TRAC): Criteria and Checklist (2007) for guidance about best practices. Inother areas, such as technology infrastructure management for digital libraries, theanswers may not be as obvious as many of the answers come from outside the librarytechnology community.

A comprehensive source of information on best practice in information technologyinfrastructure management has been, until fairly recently, relatively unknown outsideof the UK. However, with the recent release of the third version of the InformationTechnology Infrastructure Library (ITIL), this framework will certainly become a moreprominent factor in discussions of best practice related to digital library infrastructuremanagement.

The theoretical basis of ITIL can be traced back to seminal work done in the early1970s related to the management of large information technology operations. Usingstage theory as a basis, Nolan (1973) was one of the rst to propose that informationsystems, rather than being static monolithic entities, have a life cycle and that for themanagement of an IT system is to be successful for the long term, the methods formanaging the system have to change over the course of time as well. From this andother related work, further investigation in this area, particularly by researchers atIBM such as Van Schaik (1985), led to the development of IBM’s information systemsmanagement architecture in the mid-1980s.

At approximately the same time, the Central Computer and Telecommunications

Agency (CCTA) in the UK had begun development of what would become the rstversion of ITIL in response to internal problems it was facing with its systems. For thatinauspicious beginning, the ITIL has grown become an international standard(ISO/IEC 20000) which provides a cohesive set of best practice for informationtechnology service management which is drawn from the public and private sectorsworldwide (www.itil-ofcialsite.com).

Part of the reason many organizations have adopted ITIL is because it offers asystematic approach to providing and managing information technology services.Knowledge derived over the course of the last 20 years related to these issues provideswithin ITIL an overall framework and set of best practices that afford organizationswith a signicant number of benets. In addition to general concerns such as reducingcosts, improving customer satisfaction, and improving productivity, ITIL can also helpin providing effective ways of dening metrics and measuring their outcomes.

ITIL focuses on the service lifecycle associated with a project. Informationtechnology organizations in libraries that choose to improve service using ITIL willhave to spend time thinking about the lifecycle of services they provide. This may be abit complicated as while this is something we do consider in relationship to physicalassets, it is not something which we normally contemplate for services. For example,physical equipment has a clear lifecycle that begins with a requisition request and endswith equipment retirement. Services, on the other hand, are inuenced by all of the

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processes within the IT organization. Quality, stability, and availability are all directlydependent on processes within the service lifecycle.

However, unlike other guidelines and best practices we may use in digital libraries,ITIL is not solely focused on technical issues. In the latest version of ITIL, its scope hasbroaden to encompass how the services and functions within an informationtechnology organization align with and add value to the larger organization.Consequently, in addition to pragmatic advice on best practices in managingtechnological issues, ITIL also focuses on issues related to ensuring projects embarkedupon are relevant and useful from the perspective of the larger organization and are notthings that are implemented just for the sake of enhancing technology. By usingan “end-to-end” perspective that views services from their creation to their eventualdemise, one of the principal questions related to services becomes “How do we createvalue for the organization by developing and implementing services that areinnovative?”

While it may sound that ITIL focuses primarily on operational issues, this is not the

case. Within the ITIL framework, there are many stakeholders that form part of the team, some of whom have not traditionally considered themselves to be part of theservice implementation function. For instance, system developers play a large role indeveloping good infrastructure service management processes. Involvement of programmers and system analysts ensures that capacity needs as well as anticipatedcosts and availability of services will be considered early on in the design andimplementation of the project. For effective service design, customers of the digitallibrary must be considered as well. Years of ITIL usage has proven that closecooperation with customers as well as a modicum of understanding of the ITIL processby the customers, helps guarantee that information technology services will serve thepurposes of the organization.

Understanding ITIL takes a bit of doing. In the prior version of ITIL, the

methodology was described in a set of nine books. In version 3, this has been reducedto ve books that cover the major areas of IT service when an organization is using alifecycle approach. The ve books in the sets include:

(1) Service Strategy . Explores the issues related to management informationtechnology as an integral part of an organization. The focus in ITIL is to denethose processes, services, and methods that will most effectively promotesuccess of the organization as a whole. As part of this, this book describes aframework for making trade-offs within a service portfolio management contextwhich presents approaches for determining when to continue and discontinueservices.

(2) Service Design. Focuses on the identication and development of services that

are cost-effective, work as they were designed to, while aligning with andpromoting the goals of the organization.(3) Service Transition . A completely new take on change management that

concedes change is far more complex than traditional methodologieshave acknowledged. Within this construct, best practices are explored thatprovide for testing and roll out in a controlled manner while balancingthe goals of mitigating risk, assuring quality, and promoting agility andresponsiveness.

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(4) Service Operation . Focuses on the details of supporting and delivering services.(5) Continual Service Improvement . Discusses how to promote continuous

improvement as well as providing pragmatic metrics and measurementsrelated to monitoring quality and cost of services.

An added benet of the new version is that rather than focusing exclusively ontechnical staff within IT organizations, ITIL now provides material that people outsideof IT will nd useful. For example, version 3 of ITIL addresses concerns that seniormanagers may have about resource allocation, decision making related to trade-offs,and measuring outcomes. Another feature of this new version is that it documentsstandardized denitions of IT services and processes. Using these standardizeddenitions can help reduce the costs of services as well as provide end-users withconsistent results and costs.

A major drawback to implementing ITIL is the cost of the ITIL library. The cost of the complete library is approximately $800, which is a considerable investment in mostorganizations. Given the scope of ITIL, it is difcult to condense all the informationinto smaller volumes, but there are some recent titles, such as the Introduction to the ITIL Service Lifecycle from the Ofce of Government and Commerce UK, that provide acomprehensive overview of the methodology.

Anyone involved in the management of digital library projects understands thedifculties and complexities of these types of projects. While we have many guidelinesand best practices that are related to technical issues in digital libraries, the broaderservice delivery issues have not been explored in great detail. Using ITIL, managers of digital libraries, as well as users, can get a clearer picture of all the issues and at thesame time learn how other areas in information technology have successfullyaddressed similar issues.

ReferencesHiggins, S. (2007), “Draft DCC curation lifecycle model”, International Journal of Digital Curation ,

Vol. 2 No. 2, available at: www.ijdc.net/ijdc/article/view/45/52, (accessed February 3, 2008).Nolan, R.L. (1973), “Managing the computer resource: a stage hypothesis”, Communications of

the ACM , Vol. 16 No. 7, pp. 300-405.Trustworthy Repositories Audit & Certication (TRAC): Criteria and Checklist (2007), Center for

Research Libraries, Chicago, IL, available at: www.crl.edu/PDF/trac.pdf (accessedFebruary 3, 2008).

Van Schaik, E.A. (1985), A Management System for the Information Business: Organizational Analysis , Prentice-Hall, Englewood Cliffs, NJ.

Corresponding authorFrank Cervone can be contacted at: f-cervone@northwestern.edu

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This article has been cited by:

1. Professor Zahir Irani, Norita Ahmad, Noha Tarek Amer, Faten Qutaifan, Azza Alhilali. 2013. Technology adoption model and a road map to successful implementation of ITIL. Journal of Enterprise InformationManagement 26:5, 553-576. [ Abstract] [Full Text ] [PDF]

2. Norita Ahmad, Zulkifli M. Shamsudin. 2013. Systematic Approach to Successful Implementation of ITIL. Procedia Computer Science 17, 237-244. [CrossRef ]3. Mauricio Marrone, Lutz M. Kolbe. 2011. Uncovering ITIL claims: IT executives’ perception on benefits

and Business-IT alignment.Information Systems and e-Business Management 9:3, 363-380. [CrossRef ]4. Mauricio Marrone, Lutz M. Kolbe. 2011. Einfluss von IT-Service-Management-Frameworks auf die IT-

Organisation.WIRTSCHAFTSINFORMATIK 53:1, 5-19. [CrossRef ]5. Mauricio Marrone, Lutz M. Kolbe. 2011. Impact of IT Service Management Frameworks on the IT

Organization.Business & Information Systems Engineering 3:1, 5-18. [CrossRef ]