Standard, Framework and Methodologies

Hi Friends,

Today, I heard a discussion in my adjacent cubicle which forced me to think about the misconceptions about IT management terms.  They were actually talking about implementation of ITIL for IT operations.

How one can implement ITIL? Are you also confused? Let’s clarify this concept today….

I’d like to tell the meaning and difference about Standards, Framework and Methodologies.

Standards:

An agreed way of doing a task is Standard. A standard gives you a base on which you can rely and achieve the expected results by following that.

ISO 20000 is an example of Standards which is an agreed way for setting up IT Services.

Framework:

Framework is a structure that supports or guides to build a solution.

ITIL is Process Framework that provides a structure for setting up the IT services and follows ISO 20K standards.

Methodology:

A methodology is a complete system which includes Methods, Tools and Techniques to solve a problem.

Lean Six sigma is a methodology which addresses process flow and other problems or tasks.

Two main streams in IT management are IT operations Management (Business as Usual) and Project Management. Major Standards, Frameworks and Methodologies are populated in below table.

Terms	Operations Management	Project Management
Standard	ISO 20000	ISO 21500:2012
Framework	ITIL, COBIT	Agile
Methodology	Lean Six Sigma, TQM, BPM	PMBOK, PRINCE2

Hope above information clarifies the terms discussed here. Let's come back to the original question. how one can implement a Framework. Actually, we implement Standards which is supported by a Framework and different methodologies are used to achieve this and resolve the issues that comes on the way.