It is a great asset to earn your ITIL 4 Foundation certification. You will be able to better align IT and business goals if you have a solid understanding of the ITIL framework. You will gain insight into organizational processes and best practice that will not only improve your efficiency as an ITSM professional, but also enhance your ability to deliver services that help your company achieve its goals.
But does this mean that your ITIL journey should end here? The short answer is no.
What’s Next ITIL 4 Foundation? Take your skills to the next level
ITIL 4 Foundation training will prepare you to earn advanced ITIL certifications that include specialized competency. ITIL 4 Foundation training makes the knowledge more applicable in advanced ITIL certifications. This allows you to apply best practices in real-life situations and improve your leadership and service management skills.
What are the ITIL certification levels above foundation?
Advanced ITIL certifications include:
ITIL Practitioner
ITIL Management Professional
ITIL Strategic Leader
Your current job role and career goals will determine the path you take to further your ITIL education. Your interest in the hands-on, process-implementation side of ITSM will lead you in one direction, while your interest in designing, managing, and improving ITSM processes will take you to another.
These are three reasons IT professionals should continue their education beyond the ITIL 4 Foundation certification.
1. To develop hands-on ITSM skills.
ITIL Practitioner training is the next step for many who have obtained their ITIL 4 Foundation certification. The ITIL Practitioner certification teaches you how to implement service improvement based on the adopt-and-adapt ITIL philosophy. Use the ITIL 4 Foundation best practices to help you implement the ITIL framework in your business.
ITIL Practitioner training is extremely practical and reflects today’s holistic approach towards ITSM and maturing relationship between IT and business. It makes use technologies such as cloud computing and automation to improve service delivery and design. To increase the ITSM’s value, training incorporates best practices such as Agile, Lean, DevOps, and Lean.
2. To improve your ITSM management skills.
The ITIL Managing Professional path will suit you if your career goals are in strategy and management. The Managing Professional (MP), track provides technical and practical knowledge about how to manage successful IT enabled services, teams, and workflows.
This path is made up of four modules that address ITSM policy and organizational structure. They will help you to better manage and coordinate ITIL practice areas.
These are the four modules:
ITIL Specialist: Create and Deliver, Support
ITIL Specialist: Drive Stakeholder Value
ITIL Specialist: High Velocity IT
ITIL Strategist: Direct and Plan, Improve
After completing all four modules successfully, you will receive certification as an ITIL Management Professional.
3. To become an ITSM leader.
ITIL Strategic Leader (SL), track, recognizes the importance of ITIL not only for IT operations but also for all digitally-enabled service. Being an ITIL 4 Strategic leader demonstrates that you have a clear understanding about how IT influences and directs business strategies.
These are the two modules that are required to earn the ITIL Strategic Leader title:
ITIL Strategist – Direct, Plan, and Improve (this module is available in both the SL stream and the MP stream)
ITIL Leader: Digital and IT Strategy
After completing both modules successfully, you will receive certification as an ITIL Strategy Leader.
Enjoy the full benefits of ITIL
ITIL professionals will be more in demand as the alignment between IT and your business needs will only grow. ITIL 4 Foundation certification teaches you ITIL concepts and best practices. This certification will help you to be a successful ITIL 4 Foundation certified professional.