I recently attended the ITIL 4 Foundation training course organised by ISG and successfully passed the exam. Here’s some thoughts about my experience and some tips that I learned while studying for the exam.

This is a 3 days in-person course that prepares attendees for the ITIL exam. It was delivered by a training partner of Axelos who managed to turn a usually dry content into a set of engaging sessions with the help of timely coffee breaks.

As part of my role in DLAM, we currently implement ITIL practices and I was eager to learn more about ITIL so that I could better support the different services using best practices.

My experience in 30 seconds

I found the course really useful to have a better understanding of ITIL framework and key concepts. ITIL also helps to understand why UniDesk works the way it does here at the University. Another positive from the course was to meet and interact with other staff involved in ITIL practices.

The main downside is that by the end of each day everyone’s brain is saturated with information and no matter how much I like processes and workflows…it is a lot of to take in. On the other hand, the quizzes and mock exams that are introduced throughout the training sessions are really good to review, reflect on the concepts and refresh the brain.

Main Tips and Takeaways

Before the course

• Consider checking some ITIL courses available on Linkedin Learning to get a grasp of the basic concepts if you are not familiar with the ITIL framework.
• Consider buying a revision guide. I bought the ITIL Foundation Essentials by Claire Agutter (there are different guides so check and decide which one you like it better) and found it very useful before the course and specially once completed to easily review the concepts (ie on the bus) instead of login into the course content platform.

During the course

• Ask questions
• Add notes (the course platform allows to easily add notes)
• Get proper sleep (if possible)
• Bring your own coffee in the morning in case catering is delayed
• Bring layers as you never know how cold or warm you may feel the room

 After the course (Exam prep)

• Learn the terminology. There are multiple questions in the exam about key concepts definitions.
• Understand the relationships between ITIL concepts.
• Review the Mock Exams (you can find additional mock exams online) and practice until you are able to consistently achieve the desired mark.

Tips for the online exam

The ITIL® Foundation exam consists of 40 multiple-choice questions that must be completed within 60 minutes.

The online exam is an online proctored exam. It felt weird having someone “overseeing” you but without actually seeing them. However, once I started the exam I was fully focused on the questions and this was not an issue.

• Make sure that you take the exam in a suitable room (ie: the room should only have one door and your camera needs to show that door, my understanding is that if you have two doors, they have to be in view)
• Wherever you are taking the exam, ensure no one open the doors while you take the exam
• You will need to keep a clean desk and cover any extra monitors (you need to show it with your webcam)
• The proctor will gently review that all the requirements are met for the room, reading the requirements feels worst than it its (ie: I had to cover my two monitors while using just the laptop to take the exam)
• Read carefully the questions, don’t rush.
• If you get stuck on a test question, move on and come back later
• Keep an eye on the clock however, I can assure you that you will have plenty of time.
• Learn the key definitions and watch out for certain keywords (this would help you connect the wording to the right concept)
• Book your exam (important thing to remember!)

Conclusion

Do I recommend the course if you are interested in ITIL, IT or Service Management? Yes!

I took the exam on Monday after completing the course the previous Friday.

We were advised to let the content sink during the weekend and schedule the exam from Sunday on wards and not more than 1 week after completing the course so that we still have the concepts fresh in the mind. I practiced the mock exams a few times until being consistent at getting at least 30 out of 40 and…I got more than 30 in the exam 🙂

How to survive and pass the ITIL 4 Foundation exam / EdTech Unchained by is licensed under a