ITIL Foundation Interview Questions and Answers

Q1. How does ITIL help to reduce costs and minimize total cost of ownership (TCO) for IT investments?

Ans: IT investments and staff always find that they break their work timelines. This happens since the unscheduled work always takes priority over the work that is planned. ITIL can help an organization stop this continuous cycle and can therefore, help employees focus on the Total Cost of Ownership (TCO) and other activities in their department.

Q2. Who decides the categorization of a proposed change within an ITIL compliant Change Management process?

Ans: It is the task of Change Manager. A Change Manager will plays a key role in ensuring that the projects (change initiatives) meet their objectives within timelines and said budgets by increasing employee adoption and usage. This person will focus on the people’s side of change, including changes to business processes, systems and technology, job roles and organization structures.

Q3. After a Change has been implemented, an evaluation is performed. What is this evaluation called?

Ans: It is known as Post Implementation Review (PIR). PIR is an assessment and review of the complete working solution. It will be performed after a period of live running, sometimes after the project is completed.
The Post Implementation Review is used to evaluate the effectiveness of system development after the system has been in production for a specific period (usually 6 months). It is a free-form report, and not all sections are relevant or necessary to the final product. A description of the Post Implementation Review Report is always attached.

Q4. What ITIL process ensures that the organization is aware of new and changing technology?

Ans: Capacity Management is responsible for ensuring that the organization is aware of new and changing technology. It is the discipline that checks and verifies that IT infrastructure is provided at the right time in the right volume at a right price with utmost efficiency.
This involves input from many areas of the business to identify what services are (or will be) required, what IT infrastructure is required to support these services, what level of Contingency will be needed, and what will be the cost of this infrastructure.

Q5. Suppose a Service Level Manager requires confirmation wherein the internal Service Desk can answer a certain percentage of calls within 10 seconds. In what document would the Service Desk’s agreement to this requirement be recorded?

Ans: An operational level agreement (OLA) is a contract that defines how various IT groups within a company plan to deliver a service or set of services. OLAs are designed to address and solve the problem of IT silos by setting forth a specific set of criteria and defining a specific set of IT services to be performed by each department.
It should be noted that the term Service Level Agreement (SLA) is used in many companies while discussing agreements between two internal groups. However, according to Information Technology Infrastructure Library (ITIL) framework for best practices, this type of internal contract should is better known as an Operational Level Agreement.

Q6. What two Service Management processes will most likely use risk analysis and management methodology?

Ans: The two service management processes are- Availability Management and IT Service Continuity Management
ITIL Availability Management aims at defining, analyzing, planning, measuring and improving all aspects of the availability of IT services. Availability Management is responsible for ensuring that all IT infrastructure, processes, tools, roles, etc are appropriate for the agreed availability targets.
IT Service Continuity Management (ITSCM) aims at managing risks that could seriously impact IT services. ITSCM ensures that the IT service provider can always provide minimum agreed Service Levels, by reducing the risk from disaster events to an acceptable level and planning for the recovery of IT services. ITSCM should be designed to support Business Continuity Management.

Q7. Explain Service portfolio, Service catalogue and service pipeline.

Ans:

• Service portfolio: Defines services provided by service provider across all Market and all customers. The objective of ITIL Service Portfolio Management is to manage the service portfolio. Service Portfolio Management ensures that the service provider has the right mix of services to meet required business outcomes at an appropriate level of investment.
• Service Catalogue: is the sub set of Service portfolio. Services ready to be offered to customers is listed in service catalogue. An IT service catalog, sometimes called an IT service portfolio, is a list of available technology resources and offerings within an organization.
• Service Pipeline: consists of services under development. It is a great opportunity to view the direction of a service provider’s growth as it discusses and includes the future services that are currently under development by the service provider.

Q8. What is the difference between ITIL v3 and v2?

Ans: The ITIL v2 library was organized in seven core books:
(i) Service Support.
(ii) Service Delivery.
(iii) ICT Infrastructure Management.
(iv) Planning to Implement Service Management.
(v) Application Management.
(vi) The Business Perspective.
(vii) Security Management.
On the other hand, ITIL v3 is now organized into just five books:
(i) Service Strategy.
(ii) Service Design.
(iii) Service Transition.
(iv) Service Operation.
(v) Continual Service Improvement.

Basically the V2 process areas have been logically grouped into a phased lifecycle approach.

In contrast to ITIL v2, ITIL v3 clearly defines the roles and responsibilities in each process and reasons the role of communication in the entire lifecycle.

Q9. What are the different knowledge management systems?

Ans: Different knowledge management systems are:

• CMIS (Capacity Management information system): A Capacity Management Information Systemor CMIS is a collection of IT infrastructure usage, capacity and performance information that is gathered in a consistent manner and stored in one or more databases. It is a single book of record for all usage, capacity, and performance data, complete with associated business, application and service statistics. Any IT staffer who needs access to capacity management data can potentially use a CMIS.
• AMIS (Availability management information system): A virtual repository of all Availability Management data, usually stored in multiple physical locations.
• KEDB (Known error database): A Known Error is a problem that has a documented root cause and a Work around. Known Errors are managed throughout their lifecycle by the Problem Management process. The details of each Known Error are recorded in a Known Error Record stored in the Known Error Database (KEDB).
• CMDB (Configuration management database): A configuration management database(CMDB) is a database that contains all relevant information about the components of the information system used in an organization’s IT services and the relationships between those components. A CMDB provides an organized view of data and a means of examining that data from any desired perspective. Within this context, components of an information system are referred to as configuration items (CI). A CI can be any conceivable IT component, including software, hardware, documentation, and personnel as well as any combination of them. The processes of configuration management specify, control, and track configuration items and any changes made to them in a comprehensive and systematic fashion.
• DML (Definitive media library): A Definitive Media Library (DML) is a secure compound in which the definitive, authorized versions of software package configuration items (CIs) are stored and protected. A DML consists of one or more software libraries or file-storage areas referred to as repositories.
• SKMS (Service knowledge management system): ITIL Knowledge Management aims at gathering, analyzing, storing and sharing knowledge and information within an organization. The primary purpose of Knowledge Management is to improve efficiency by reducing the need to rediscover knowledge

Q10. What are the ITIL based models adopted by an organization.

Ans:

• Microsoft MOF: Microsoft Operations Framework (MOF) is a series of 23 documents that guide IT professionals through the processes of creating, implementing and managing efficient and cost-effective services.
• Hewlett – Packard (HP ITSM Reference Model): This model is a significant tool useful in presenting and describing the several IT Management processes, inter-process relationships, and business linkages that IT needs to put in place for successful development, deployment and support of services in the e-world.
• IBM (IT Process Model ):– IBM Process and Service Models software is an industry template that enables you to define common business processes and services across the enterprise. The software consists of a set of best practice business process models and service definitions to support core system renewal and integration projects.

Q11. What is the relation between Availability, Availability service time and downtime?

Ans: Availability % = (Available service time –downtime) / Available service time to ensure that all the IT services are available and are functioning correctly whenever customers and users want to use them in the framework of the SLAs in force.

Q12. What is ISO/IEC 27002?

Ans: ISO/IEC 27002:2013 gives guidelines for organizational information security standards and information security management practices including selection, implementation and management of controls, taking into consideration the organization’s information security risk environment(s).

It is designed to be used by organizations that intend to:

• Select controls within the process of implementing an Information Security Management System based on ISO/IEC 27001;
• Implement commonly accepted information security controls, and Develop their independent information security management guidelines.

Q13. What is Plan-Do-Check-Act (PDSA) cycle?

Ans: The PDSA Cycle is a systematic series of steps for gaining valuable learning and knowledge for the continual improvement of a product or process. Also known as the Deming Wheel, or Deming Cycle, the concept and application was first introduced to Dr. Deming by his mentor, Walter Shewhart of the famous Bell Laboratories in New York.

The four phases in the Plan-Do-Check-Act Cycle involve:

Ans: 

• Plan:Identifying and analyzing the problem.
• Do:Developing and testing a potential solution.
• Check:Measuring how effective the test solution was, and analyzing whether it could be improved in any way.
• Act: Implementing the improved solution fully.

Q14. What type of information is captured in an information security policy?

Ans: Information security policies are the documented business and technical rules for protecting an organization from information security risk faced by its business and technical infrastructure. These written policy documents provide a high-level description of the various controls, which the organization will use to manage its information security risks.
The information security policy documents are also considered to be a formal declaration of management’s intent to protect its information asset from relevant risks. In specific cases, the policies are supported by information security procedures that identify key activities required to implement relevant information security policies.

Q15. What is a balanced scorecard?

Ans: Balanced scorecard is a strategic planning and management system that is used extensively in business and industry, government, and nonprofit organizations worldwide to align business activities to the vision and strategy of the organization, improve internal and external communications, and monitor organization performance against strategic goals.

Q16. What is a Service Request?

Ans: Service requests are a formal request submitted by a user for some type of service, software, or hardware. A Service request generally refers to something the user wants and/or needs but does not already have, such as a printer or laptop. Service requests often involve items that are already approved. For instance, if it is a company policy that all employees get access to the cloud-based CRM system, and someone from the marketing department sends a service request for access to the CRM, this does not need any additional approval. The IT help desk can simply fulfill this request.

Q17. What type of information is stored in a CMDB?

Ans: CMDB contains contents that are intended to hold a collection of IT assets commonly referred to as configuration items (CI) as well as descriptive relationships between such assets. When populated, the repository becomes a means of understanding how critical assets such as information systems are composed, what are their upstream sources or dependencies, and what are their downstream targets.

Q18. Is there a trade-off between return and risk?

Ans: According to modern portfolio theory, there is a trade-off between risk and return. All other factors being equal, if a particular investment incurs a higher risk of financial loss for prospective investors, those investors must be able to expect a higher return in order to be attracted to the higher risk.
In majority of cases, even though there is no promise of higher returns on risky assets, so the higher risk just tends to scare off potential investors, keeping the returns on a given investment low. The only investments that can really try to promise higher returns for higher risk are bonds, and even then the higher returns won’t be generated if the issuing organization goes default.

Q19. What is the difference between end-users and customers?

Ans:

End-User:  An end user or end customer directly receives the service or employs the product. End users are not the only customers as there may be intermediate entities like purchasing departments, whose expectations or needs must be carried forward through a series of service contracts or requirement definitions.
Customer: A customer may or may not have the ability to choose between different products and suppliers. For instance- In monopoly situations like local telephone and cable television services, there are scenarios when end users do not make the purchasing decision. It may include Clients of social service agencies or court-appointed lawyers or employees of an organization where the purchasing department makes the choices.

Q20. How is IT Service Continuity Management (ITSCM) related to Business Continuity Planning (BCP)?

Ans: IT Service Continuity is a subset of Business Continuity Planning (BCP) and encompasses IT disaster recovery planning and wider IT resilience planning. It also incorporates those elements of IT infrastructure and services that relate to communications such as (voice) telephony and data communications.
It is a systematic process to prevent, predict and manage Information and Communications Technology (ICT) disruption and incidents, which have the potential to disrupt ICT services and should result in a more resilient IT service capability aligned to wider organizational requirements.

Q21. If we used an external organisation to help us develop part of our service, what would that be called?

Ans: Outsourcing

Q22. Can you name a risk that might occur whilst designing a service?

Ans: Risks can come in many different forms including; financial markets, failures with IT or business projects, legal liabilities, credit risk, accidents and mistakes, natural causes and disasters as well as deliberate attacks from an adversary such as hacking.

Q23. Can you name 3 types of SLA?

Ans:

1. Service based SLA
2. Customer based SLA
3. Multi level SLA

Q24. In your opinion, what should an SLA contain?

Ans: Typically, an SLA is made up of any of the following:

• Service name
• Clearance information (with location and date)
• Contract duration
• Description/ desired customer outcome
• Service and asset criticality
• Reference to further contracts which also apply (e.g. SLA Master Agreement)
• Service times
• Required types and levels of support
• Service level requirements/ targets
• Mandated technical standards and specification of the technical service interface
• Responsibilities
• Costs and pricing
• Change history
• List of annexes

Q25. Why would you use SACM?

Ans: The Operational Level Agreement is an agreement between an IT service provider and another part of the same organization. This could be the development team, the support team or helpdesk

Q27. Why do we need CSFs?

Ans: Critical Success Factor (CSF) is the term for an element that is necessary for an organization or project to achieve its mission. It is what drives the company forward through its strategy.

Q28. When would we create a Service Design Package?

Ans: An SDP is produced for each new IT service, major change, or IT service retirement.

Q29. What type of information would you store in the Service Catalogue?

Ans: The Service Catalogue contains a list of services that an organization provides, often to its employees or customers. For each service within the catalogue, we typically include description, timeframes or SLA for fulfilling the service, owners (who is entitled to request/view the service), costs and how to fulfil the service.

Q30. Can you give an example of a policy?

Ans: Attachment sizes for mailboxes

Q31. Why would you use Change Management?

Ans: We use Change Management to standardize our methods and procedures for dealing with changes and thereby reducing risk and disruption. We record all changes to assets or confirmation items in the Configuration Management System. This allows us to define and agree on those changes and ensure that only people who have the appropriate authority can make changes.

Q32. What are the steps you would follow when a Change Request comes in?

Ans:

• Record it
• Evaluate it
• Prioritize it
• Plan it
• Test it
• Finally, implement it

Q33. What information would you attach to a Release Policy?

Ans:

• Unique identification for the release
• Type of release (minor, major, beta, alpha etc)
• Naming conventions for the release e.g. dates, times, version numbers
• Description of the release
• Roles for each stage of the release
• Expected frequency
• Mechanisms to build, install and distribute the release (focusing on re-use and efficiency here)
• Criteria for acceptance of the release into various environments (test, training, live etc.)

Q34. What inputs do we need before we can being testing a service?

Ans:

• Service package
• SLP
• Interface definitions for the service provider
• Release plans
• Acceptance criteria

Q35. Can you name 3 types of testing?

Ans: All of these are types of testing:

• Usability testing
• Accessibility testing
• Process testing
• Stress and load testing
• Availability testing
• Compatibility testing
• Security testing
• Regression testing