8.1. ITIL and DevOps
💡 First Principle: ITIL and DevOps are complementary, not competing — ITIL provides the service management framework, governance, and holistic view, while DevOps provides practices for fast, reliable flow of software — and used together they deliver speed and control.
Why care: organizations often frame ITIL and DevOps as rivals (process vs. speed), then pick one and lose the other's benefits. Seeing them as complementary lets an organization move fast and stay governed. The mental model: DevOps is the high-speed engine; ITIL is the steering, alignment, and guardrails that keep the speed pointed at value.
⚠️ Common Misconception: That ITIL and DevOps are mutually exclusive — heavyweight process versus agile speed. In Version 5's framing they reinforce each other across the lifecycle.
