ITIL ITSM Guiding Principles 2 — Questions and Answers
Question 1: An organization wants to adopt ITIL but is concerned about disrupting existing processes that work well. Which guiding principle best addresses this concern?
- Focus on value
- Start where you are (Correct answer)
- Keep it simple and practical
- Collaborate and promote visibility
Correct answer: Start where you are
'Start where you are' advises assessing current state and preserving what works rather than starting from scratch.
Question 2: Which guiding principle is most directly violated when a service team delivers outputs that customers never actually use?
- Think and work holistically
- Progress iteratively with feedback
- Optimize and automate
- Focus on value (Correct answer)
Correct answer: Focus on value
'Focus on value' requires that all activities create value for stakeholders; unused outputs indicate a failure to apply this principle.
Question 3: A large IT department creates a 200-step approval workflow for a simple password reset. Which principle does this most violate?
- Collaborate and promote visibility
- Keep it simple and practical (Correct answer)
- Start where you are
- Progress iteratively with feedback
Correct answer: Keep it simple and practical
'Keep it simple and practical' means eliminating unnecessary steps that add complexity without adding value.
Question 4: During a service improvement initiative, a team discovers siloed teams causing handoff failures. Which guiding principle should guide the remediation?
- Think and work holistically (Correct answer)
- Optimize and automate
- Start where you are
- Focus on value
Correct answer: Think and work holistically
'Think and work holistically' promotes understanding how all parts of an organization interact to deliver value end-to-end.
Question 5: Which guiding principle specifically recommends that automation should only follow process optimization?
- Progress iteratively with feedback
- Think and work holistically
- Optimize and automate (Correct answer)
- Keep it simple and practical
Correct answer: Optimize and automate
'Optimize and automate' states that processes should be optimized before automation to avoid embedding inefficiencies.
Question 6: A service manager shares real-time incident dashboards with both IT staff and business stakeholders. Which guiding principle does this exemplify?
- Focus on value
- Collaborate and promote visibility (Correct answer)
- Keep it simple and practical
- Progress iteratively with feedback
Correct answer: Collaborate and promote visibility
'Collaborate and promote visibility' encourages transparent sharing of information to improve decision-making and trust.
Question 7: An ITIL Practitioner is designing a new change process. They decide to release a minimal version first and refine it based on user feedback. Which principle are they applying?
- Keep it simple and practical
- Think and work holistically
- Start where you are
- Progress iteratively with feedback (Correct answer)
Correct answer: Progress iteratively with feedback
'Progress iteratively with feedback' advocates releasing incremental improvements and using feedback loops to guide each subsequent iteration.
ITIL ITSM Guiding Principles 2
An organization wants to adopt ITIL but is concerned about disrupting existing processes that work well.
Which guiding principle best addresses this concern?