Plain-English definitions of the ITIL terms for Foundation study. Simplified for learning; PeopleCert’s materials are authoritative.
| Term | Definition |
|---|---|
| Service management | Capabilities for delivering value through services. |
| Service | A means of enabling value co-creation without owning the costs/risks. |
| Value | The perceived benefits, usefulness and importance of something. |
| Utility | ”Fit for purpose” — what a service does. |
| Warranty | ”Fit for use” — how well a service performs. |
| Outcome | A result for a stakeholder enabled by outputs. |
| Cost / risk | The money spent / the possibility of harm or loss. |
| Service relationship | The cooperation between provider and consumer. |
| SVS | Service Value System — how components create value. |
| Service value chain | The six core activities that turn demand into value. |
| Guiding principle | A recommendation that guides an organisation always. |
| Four dimensions | People, information/tech, partners, value streams. |
| Practice | A set of resources for performing work (e.g., incident management). |
| Incident | An unplanned interruption or reduction in service quality. |
| Problem | A cause, or potential cause, of one or more incidents. |
| Change | The addition, modification or removal of anything that could affect services. |
| Service request | A predefined, user-initiated request for something. |
| Service desk | The single point of contact between provider and users. |
| Continual improvement | Ongoing alignment of services with changing needs. |
| Configuration item | Any component that needs to be managed to deliver a service. |