ITIL How to Implement Official Book – a universal guide for successful transformation

Kaimar Karu – lead author

The new ITIL How to Implement Official Book is now live for PeopleCert Plus members.

What does this latest ITIL publication provide to both ITIL and non-ITIL professionals and organizations – and why is it an important addition to the ITIL library in 2025?

Lead author, Kaimar Karu, explains:

1. Impact on governance

Organizations often lack understanding of the impact of a transformation on their governance and the constraints the present governance sets.

When changing either a part of or a whole enterprise, leaders shouldn’t ignore what already exists but, in the case of a significant change, should tailor a transformation approach that fits governance for the current world, while designing the future world. Present governance, if ignored, may make certain change activities difficult, and there’s no point trying to push new ways of working where they won’t be supported or actively ignored.

2. The unknown unknowns

Organizations should know the desired direction of the transformation, but the way to get there is often unknowable and needs to be discovered while being adjusted continually for real-world feedback. For example, mapping a five-year transformation in detail suggests that the assumptions made today will be the same in one, two, or three years’ time, and therefore the transformation will have no impact on the organization.

Not everything is unknowable – many activities to deliver the transformation can be known through experience, but the question remains about what will work and what unintended consequences might occur.

3. Culture

Culture often gets neglected before, during, and after a transformation and is an easy target to blame for the inevitable failure.

For all these reasons – and more – organizations need to choose the approach that best fits their planned transformation. This is about getting from A to B while not yet knowing what B might look like. And this is why we have created the ITIL: How to Implement guide.

But what makes ITIL – and this latest guidance – relevant still today?

Moving from the old world to the new

More and more organizations are shifting to the service economy, and this move, since the launch of ITIL 4’s enhanced view of services in 2019, has not slowed down. However, numerous enterprises are struggling to move into that world, and ITIL provides the guidance they need.

The ITIL learning pathway, along with the 34 practice guides, describes the key service management capabilities that an organization should tailor to their context. These, in combination, give a clear view for the service management leader of what good looks like and what the future state of their organization could look like.

However, while ITIL has primarily focused on the “why” and the “what” up to now, the new ITIL How to Implement Official Book offers additional content on the “how”, described in a practical and pragmatic manner.

So, the new publication helps organizations choose the approaches that will make the desired future state a reality.

Core concepts in ITIL How to Implement Official Book

The starting point when providing practical guidance for how to use this new guidance is accepting that professionals and their organizations can’t fully control everything that happens during transformation.

However, it’s still possible to be ready and well-prepared to manage unexpected situations and make course corrections. This is where the ITIL How to Implement Official Book fits. Among its comprehensive guide to organizational transformation, some of the core concepts include:

1. The patterns

 Initiation patterns
Exploring the common initiation patterns for transformational change (e.g., regulatory compliance requirement, structural business change, etc.), setting the scene for the strategic objectives, and the best-fitting approaches to carry out the transformation.

 Governance patterns
Covering all governance activities: engaging stakeholders, evaluating, directing, and monitoring across both business as usual (BAU) and transformation governance. This addresses one of the key challenges with many transformation efforts – ignoring existing governance that might not yet support the objectives set out in the transformation’s objectives and not designing the transformation approach accordingly. Fit-for-purpose governance needs to enable and support change, not stifle it.

 Execution patterns
Outlining three options: contain – where immediate decisions and action are needed to respond to business risk/loss of opportunity; discover – to deal with multiple unknowns and learn more about the environment to decide on a structured approach; implement – where pre-planning is possible because the “what” and “how” are already known.

This is also about not becoming locked into an approach by allowing for learning, reflection on the validity of a chosen approach and allowing flexibility on the “how” while still achieving the strategic objectives.

2. The transformation model

The model describes the activities carried out throughout the transformation in a structured, yet flexible manner, ensuring the relevant information is captured and decisions made at the right time, with the right feedback mechanisms in place. The model covers the overarching layers, the key stages, and the individual steps in those stages to help build the necessary capabilities that allow the transformation to succeed.

The specific configuration of the approach depends on the type of transformation and organizational context, but with guidance provided for each step, this will avoid becoming a “recipe”: instead, the model describes the things to do, why these need to be done, and the tools to apply in various contexts to help all types of organizations.

3. Methods and techniques

A dedicated chapter in the book – designed for people unfamiliar or less experienced with certain methods, tools and techniques such as benchmarking and building a business case – provides additional guidance for the “what”, “why” and “how” of each.

Supporting the quest for successful transformation

The key components of any transformation remain the same, regardless of whether an organization is service-led, non-service led or trying to decide what it is. Therefore, the ITIL How to Implement Official Book is valid for all organizations wanting to run a transformation, whether they have already adopted ITIL or not.

When thinking about any type of transformation, organizations need to consider not only the traditional process and technology aspects, but also – and perhaps most importantly – the people aspect. ITIL 4 has described the 4 dimensions of service management, and the ITIL How to Implement Official Book shows how to consider all four simultaneously in a transformation and describes the required steps for a holistic approach.

Since the early publication of the official book, practitioners’ feedback has been really positive, with comments focused on how it’s “practical”, “fills a gap”, and how they “can start using it from tomorrow”.

When practitioners say they find something helpful and plan to use it in their work, that’s the best validation we could hope for.

While still new, as organizations start using the guidance to carry out their transformations, they will learn how to navigate complexity, always consider the four dimensions of service management, and learn to adopt guidance that reflects their context.

With the help of the transformation approach and the governance patterns, the publication helps organizations successfully deliver the transformation’s objectives by blending the transformational work with BAU work in a way that does not overwhelm the organization and its people.