New Guidance From IT Governance Institute Maps COBIT 4.1 With ITIL v3

Comprehensive Approach to IT Governance and Service Management

(25.08.08) -To help enterprises take a comprehensive approach to IT governance and service management, the IT Governance Institute (ITGI) has released new guidance mapping COBIT 4.1 with ITIL Version 3. Titled COBIT Mapping: Mapping of ITIL v3 With COBIT 4.1, the document provides both a high-level and a detailed mapping.

In developing ITIL v3, the UK Office of Government Commerce (OGC) performed an extensive survey to identify user requirements and found that ITIL’s audience wanted a stronger linkage to COBIT. By using the best practices together, enterprises benefit from more comprehensive guidance that indicates what should be done (via COBIT) and how (via ITIL).

"When used together, COBIT and ITIL provide a top-to-bottom approach to IT governance and, more specifically, service management. COBIT guides management’s priorities and objectives with a holistic approach to a full range of IT activities, and ITIL supports this with best practices for service management,” said Robert Stroud, international vice president of ITGI and an IT governance evangelist at CA. "When combined, the power of both approaches is amplified, with a greater likelihood of cost savings, effective control and management support.”

Introduced as an IT process and control framework linking IT to business requirements, COBIT (Control Objectives for Information and related Technology) initially was used by the assurance community in conjunction with business and IT process owners. With the addition of management guidelines and tools such as metrics and maturity models, COBIT was used more frequently as a management framework. In 2005, it became a more complete IT governance framework with the release of COBIT 4.0. COBIT was further fine-tuned in 2007, when the current edition, COBIT 4.1, was introduced.

Developed by the OGC, ITIL (IT Infrastructure Library) is the most widely accepted best practice for IT service management. Version 3 consists of 27 detailed processes organized into five high-level processes described in five core publications. ITIL v3 also introduced the concept of the service life cycle, which is described in the sixth ITIL publication.

COBIT Mapping: Mapping of ITIL v 3 With COBIT 4.1 is available as a PDF download at www.isaca.org/cobitmappings . The publication is free to ISACA members and is US $25 for nonmembers. (ITGI: ra)