In a world in which people and organizations have to communicate in constantly changing settings standards play a big role. By standards we mean established, described, and widely accepted agreements that make communication between systems – people process and technology – possible and predictable.

Getronics has a long history in using and developing IT standards. In 1990 they introduced ITIL into the Dutch market. Subsequently they have helped redevelop ITIL and at the same time expanded the best practices with the development of ASL and BiSL. They have demonstrated their thought leadership and practical knowledge in all areas of IT management and always shared this knowledge with others. In their view a common language to communicate at different levels seems a prerequisite of the network society.

This publication Implementing leading standards for IT Management gives the vision of Getronics on standardization in IT. It explains why standards are so important today, the way in which standards come about and how they are accepted. The book describes why IT professionals should adopt and use standards.

This publication does not pretend to give an overview of all standards available. On the contrary, it is the selection of standards that was made by Getronics that makes this book useful. It is their conviction or vision that these standards are dominant, inescapable or promising. These standards are: EFQM, Six Sigma, Malcolm Baldrige, CobiT, ITIL, ASL, BiSL, ISO/IEC 20000, CMMI, ISO 17799, MOF, ISPL, PRINCE2, IPMA, PMI-PMBOK, MSP, XML, J2EE, .NET, MDA, UML The co-operation of people, processes and technology play an important role in the provision of good information services. Standards play a vital role in communication at all levels between the components of information services. With this book the authors want to help organizations making the right choices.