Day 3 Thursday November 27, 2008 - 11:15 am - 12:00 pm

Javed Abbasi
Standards Experts

Role of COBIT and ITIL V 3 in Aligning IT with Business

• COBIT approach for Alignment
• COBIT's alignment Tool-Box
• ITIL V 3 Components for Alignment
• ITIL V 3 approach for Alignment
• Peeking in to the Future: Beyond IT-Business Alignment

COBIT, “Control Objectives for Information and related Technology” is a set of best practices (framework) for information technology (IT) management created by the Information Systems Audit and Control Association (ISACA), and the IT Governance Institute (ITGI). COBIT provides managers, auditors, and IT users with a set of generally accepted measures, indicators, processes and best practices to assist them in maximizing the benefits derived through the use of information technology and developing appropriate IT governance and control in a company.

The presentation discusses COBIT’s approach for alignment of IT with business. If someone has to describe COBIT in one sentence then it would be “Align IT with Business.” In addition, COBIT has different components which can offer quick-wins in IT-Business alignment; these components will be discussed as “COBIT’s IT-Business Alignment Tool-box”.

The second hot topic is Information Technology Infrastructure Library (ITIL), which is a customizable framework of best practices designed to promote quality computing services in the information technology (IT) sector. It supports IT Service Management (ITSM) framework and provides a systematic approach to the provisioning and management of IT services, from inception through design, implementation, operation and continual improvement. The processes identified and described within ITIL are supplier and platform independent and apply to all aspects of IT infrastructure. Since the mid 1990s, ITIL has been generally considered a de facto international standard for IT Service Management.

ITIL has recently undergone a refresh as ITIL V3. The major difference between v3 and its predecessor v2, is that v3 has adopted an integrated service lifecycle approach to IT Service Management, as opposed to organizing itself around the concepts of IT Service Delivery and Support. The presentation will discuss in detail the ITIL V3 approach in alignment of IT with business. In the end, we will also try to peek in to the future, as what is else is in the pipeline under the banner of “Beyond IT-Business Alignment”.