ITSM Academy Announces Exciting Addition to Service Catalog Class Schedule - Visible Ops: Implementing ITIL(R) in 4 Practical and Auditable Steps.

FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. -- ITSM Academy, Inc. announced today a new addition to their service catalog, a two-day training class entitled Visible Ops: The Class. The course was built in partnership with the Information Technology Process Institute (ITPI) and is based on the Visible Ops methodology ITPI developed in search of a satisfactory answer to the question:

"I believe in the need for IT process improvement . . . But where do I start?"

ITPI researchers agreed; while the Information Technology Infrastructure Library(TM) (ITIL(R)) provides a wealth of best practices, they concluded it lacks guidance for the questions; What do I implement first? How do I do it?

The Visible Ops Handbook was written to help answer these questions, to serve as prescriptive roadmap for organizations both beginning and continuing their IT process improvement journey. The authors met with hundreds of IT organizations and identified eight (8) high-performers; those with the highest service levels, best security and best efficiencies. For years they studied these organizations to isolate what made them so successful. From this research, the Visible Ops methodology was born.

The Visible Ops Handbook: Implementing ITIL in Four Practical and Auditable Steps, discusses how these high performing organizations (with "amazing kung-fu") achieved their transformation from good to great. How they worked to earn this level of efficiency and developed internal processes that allowed them to continually improve their performance levels.

Visible Ops: The Class was developed by ITSM Academy in partnership with ITPI and the authors of the Handbook, Gene Kim, Kevin Behr and George Spafford. It is built around a case study simulation -- From Chaos to Control(TM) and is intended for individuals and organizations starting or enhancing IT process improvement efforts and interested in understanding the internal workings of high performing organizations.

The course objectives are to impart lessons learned and describe a control based entry point into the world of ITIL, which can be leveraged to springboard process improvements. Attendees will learn how to replicate the key processes of these high-performing organizations in just four steps: Stabilize the Patient, Catch & Release, Establish Repeatable Build Library and Continual Improvement.

"We are so pleased to have worked with the ITPI to offer this practical class to the IT Service Management Community," said Jayne Groll, President, ITSM Academy. "Often our learners, charged with leading best practice process improvement, will attend an ITIL Foundation class and inevitable ask on the final day, 'How do I get started?'. This course gives us all an answer to that question. The simulation, From Chaos to Control(TM), really brings the lessons learned in the Handbook to life. It lets our learners, through hands-on participation, gain practical experience in effecting positive change."

"The Visible Ops Handbook codifies what we learned from studying high performing IT organizations and the common traits in their process improvement efforts. It is interesting to note, regardless of size and current level of process maturity, they all followed similar steps. They all learned how to improve. The Handbook will hopefully give the reader the impetus, and training is the logical next step to implementing," said Kevin Behr, Chief Technology Officer of IP Services and President of ITPI.

"When we were looking for a training partner, the depth and breadth of ITSM Academy's course offering made them a natural choice. They are in a unique position to integrate ITIL training with many of the concepts and activities the Visible Ops Methodology defines," continue Behr. "They bring the Subject Matter Expert perspective, 'Here is what ITIL says and here is how Visible Ops fits'. We see this class as providing a real value to the community."

ABOUT ITSM ACADEMY, INC

ITSM Academy, Inc., founded in 2003, is a full service provider of IT Service Management (ITSM) education and advice. Our flexible and sustainable training and mentoring, including IT Infrastructure Library(TM) (ITIL(R)), Microsoft(R) Operations Framework (MOF) and Visible Ops, helps our clients reduce costs and improve customer satisfaction through better alignment of business and information technology.

ITSM Academy provides personalized training built on our extensive backgrounds as IT Service Professionals. Our business values are founded in trust, loyalty, professionalism and long term relationships. Our single focus is on ITSM training and advice, we do resell software products or any third-party tools.

ITSM Academy is a Minority Owned, state certified training provider servicing Information Technology and business professionals in both the corporate and public sectors throughout the Americas.

ABOUT THE IT PROCESS INSTITUTE

The IT Process Institute (ITPI) is not for profit organization that exists to support the membership of IT audit, security, and operations professionals. Our mission is to advance IT management science through independent research, benchmarking, and prescriptive guidance. Our vision is to identify and study top performing IT organizations to create evidence based best practices that enhance the efficiency and effectiveness of member organizations. ITPI creates research based measurement tools, prescriptive adoption methods, and control metrics that facilitate management by fact. www.itpi.org.

(R)ITIL is a registered trademark of the UK Office of Government Commerce.