Rob England has produced a wide range of content for Two Hills:
Books
Training courses, workshops, seminars
White papers
Presentations: online and conferences
Articles
Websites and blogging
See some of Rob's speaking and writing topics here.
Rob was the editor of the itSMF New Zealand's (roughly) quarterly newsletter for seven years.
Shared
Rob has shared much knowledge with the IT community:
- The Unicorn Management Model for new ways of managing.
- Standard+Case, a new approach to service response
- A Supplier Engagement Model
- Tipu, a new approach to service improvement
- A basic service management model
- Service management checklists
- Sample service catalogues
- A DevOps reading list
- BOKKED: The Body Of Knowledge Known Error Database
- Crap Factoids: analyst "research" and other bull excrement
- V3 process list / xref
- V3 role list
- V3 policy list
- V2 to V3 diagram
- Ops4Less™: cost-saving tips for IT operations
- CoPr: the Core Practice framework (defunct)
Most web content by Two Hills Ltd is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License, i.e. it is placed into the public domain.
Books
- The agile Manager, R. England and C. Vu, available soon
- Introduction to Real ITSM, R. England,
Custom Books 2008, ISBN: 978-1-4382-4306-1, available on Amazon (humour) - Plus! The Standard+Case Approach, R. England, Two Hills 2013
- BSM: Basic Service Management, R. England, Two Hills 2011 (also in Spanish)
- The IT Skeptic Looks at CMDB, R. England,
Two Hills 2009, ISBN: 978-0-9582969-1-5 (still selling after all these years) - A lead author on VeriSM - A service management approach for the digital age
- The Worst of the IT Skeptic, R. England, Two Hills 2009, ISBN: 144147837X
- Owning ITIL: A Decision Maker's Guide, R. England, Two Hills 2009, ISBN: 144147885X
- Working in IT, R. England, Two Hills 2009, ISBN: 1442129999
- Editorial Board and Contributing Author on IT Service Management Global Best Practices - Volume 1, Jan van Bon Editor, Van Haren 2008, ISBN: 9789087531003
- In preparation: The Tipu Handbook, R. England, Two Hills 201?? - ON HOLD
- Planned: realIT
- Planned: Even Worse of the IT Skeptic
- Planned: Authenticity
- Planned: BSM second edition
- Planned: Basic DevOps
More information on each book and where they can be purchased
Training
Training courses and coaching programs
Workshops and seminars
Half-day and one-day seminars for conferences or onsite for individual clients include
The latest listing and full details are here.
White Papers and e-books
- 7 Crazy Goals to Start You on Your ITSM Journey to DevOps for XMatters
- How organisations have failed their IT like a bad parent The IT Skeptic
- Standard + Case: How IT Response Models Drive Modern Operations for XMatters
- The state of ITIL
for APM Group
published on the official ITIL website - Managing Complex IT Value Streams: Outcomes From The Pink Think Tank 2014 for Pink Elephant.
- Sensible Service Management for Citrix.
- Whitepaper on Checklists for Citrix
- Open Source Knowledge Network of Core Business Practices for Small Business: Why Pay for Gold When Copper Will Do?
US Association of Small Business and Entrepreneurship Annual Conference
Florida, USA, January 2007
presented in absentia by voice recording, hosted by Dr Bill Schulte - ITIL Through the Looking Glass: What we can all learn from scaling down ITIL
presented at itSMFnz National Conference
Wellington, NZ, 2006
Presentations
Rob has done many keynotes, presentations and workshops.
Videos
In no particular order...
-
With the awesome Damon Edwards, at DevOps Enterprise Summit 2016
Talking about the IT Revolution, at DevOps Enterprise Summit 2015
- Here is Rob presenting a keynote to 400 people at the Service Desk Institute conference in Birmingham 2013, which was simulcast to the global virtual TFT13 conference - a world first!!
- Kamu: reconciling ITSM and DevOps at LEADit 2013 Australian conference
- Facilitating a "Hypothetical" panel discussion at LEADit 2013 Australian conference
- Interview re "Free Lunch", for ManageEngine
- Standard+Case on the inaugural TFT12 global online conference
- DevOps - What's it all about? SITS 2013, Edgbaston, England
- An interview on ITSMTV with the IT Skeptic: background and persona.
- ITSMTV interview in Las Vegas for PINK13
- Skep Chat: online Google+ hangouts to discuss recent posts on my blog
- Knowledge Management: a panel discussion for SHIFT TV
- ITSMTV interview in Las Vegas for PINK12
- Rob interviewed at itSMF Australia national conference 2012.
- A three-way interview with Pink Elephant and Service-Now, using Oovoo technology.
- A satirical launch video for the Russian translation of Rob's satirical book.
- Rob interviewed at itSMF Australia national conference 2011.
- An experimental series of "Attenborough-style" ITSM primers:
Playlist on Youtube with more videos
Webinars and Podcasts
Rob has a new series of podcasts called RealIT Radio
Rob was a regular host on ITSM Weekly Podcast Antipodean Edition from 2012 to 2013
- The Importance of Culture Change for IT Success, for Australian Computer Society
- To Protect and Serve, for CA Technologies
- twitterchat on the death of privacy and hopes for benevolent sunrveillance: Big Uncle
- Dead Cat Syndrome, for TFT14 Summer global conference
- Overcoming the Top IT Service Management Software Upgrade Obstacles, for EasyVista
- Value from Problem Management, for Brighttalk
- Real IT, for ManageEngine
- The End of Service Catalogue, for Biomni
- ITSM Checklists, for Citrix
- When You Do (and Don’t) Need a Service Catalogue, for Biomni
- Twitterchat on service catalogue vs request catalogue for Biomni
- Seven Habits of Highly Effective Service Desks, for Citrix. Presented three times for differing timezones: USA, UK/Europe, Australia/NZ/Asia
- Guest on The DevOps Cafe podcast.
- Break Free From ITSM for Citrix Online.
- Business vs. Technical service catalogue for Biomni.
- Why IT projects fail and how to do better, for Citrix Online
- The IT Skeptic's Tipu improvement method for BMC Numara
- How to Keep Your IT Career Secure for Citrix Online, and again
- Understanding Geeks: What Makes Them Special and Valuable, for Citrix Online
- Cowboys, Acrobats and Rainmakers, for itSMF Australia
- Service Catalogue for Numara
- A series of webinars on service management topics for ManageEngine Service Desk Plus.
Handouts
- Slideshare on Kamu: reconciling DevOps and ITSM to NZ National DevOpsDay 2013
- A Harmonious IT Environment (Real ITSM)
New Zealand Computer Society
Auckland, Hamilton, Wellington, Christchurch, Dunedin NZ, March 2010 - Governing ITIL
ISACA, Wellington, October 2009 - Owning ITIL
New Zealand Computer Society
Wellington, NZ, June 2009 - Should you approve that ITIL Initiative?
and panel discussion (moderator) “CMDB as defined in theory cannot be done within a justifiable ROI”
itSMF Asia Summit 2008, Singapore - Should you approve that ITIL Initiative?
itSMF Thailand 2008, Bangkok - How to ensure proper expenditure on ITIL projects
rated Excellent:55.6%, Very Good:44.4%
and Panel Discussion (member): Anticipating the Future to Start Crucial Changes Now
Bright*Star Inaugural IT Service Management Summit
Auckland, NZ, September 2008 - Workshop Should you "do" an ITIL project/initiative?
and presentation Which Way with IT Service Management?
Rated 2nd-equal-best speaker overall
and roundtable ITIL revisited with IT Skeptic, Ian Clayton, Brian Johnson, Paul Wilkinson
"The most unbalanced team you can currently find..."
Best Practices in IT Management itSMFnl conference
Ede, Netherlands, April 2008 - A sceptic's view of ITIL Version 3
New Zealand Computer Society
Wellington, NZ, September 2007
See the resulting article in NZ Computerworld
Conferences
Since founding Two Hills, Rob has attended or presented at the following conferences (not including client engagements, or local chapter meetings of DevOps Meetup, itSMF, ISACA, NZ Computer Society etc, or webinars, or uncounted conferences in previous roles):
- ITSM-Horizon, virtual, 30 September 2021 (speaker)
- DevOps India Summit, virtual, 28 August, 2021 (keynote)
- IT Service Management Conference Greece, virtual, 4 February 2021 (keynote)
- Open Leadership Symposium, Boston, 13-15 May 2019
- Agile Vietnam, Hanoi, 17-18 November 2018 (Cherry speaker)
- DevOpsDays NZ, 5-6 November 2018
- DevOps Enterprise Summit, USA, October 2018 (speaker)
- Service Management Conference, Canberra, 5-6 September 2018 (speaker)
- REdeploy, San Francisco, August 2018
- ITx, Wellington, 12-13 July 2018 (speaker)
- itSMFnz at ITx Conference, Wellington, 12-13 July 2018 (speaker)
- DevOps Enterprise Summit, London, 25-26 June 2018 (speaker)
- Pink Elephant 22nd Annual International IT Service Management Conference, USA, February 2018 (5x speaker, and half-day workshop)
- DevOps Enterprise Summit, USA, November 2017 (speaker)
- itSMFnz New Zealand, June 2017 (speaker)
- DevOps Enterprise Summit, UK, June 2017 (speaker)
- Pink Elephant 21st Annual International IT Service Management Conference, USA, February 2017 (Think Tank workshop, 5x speaker, and half-day workshop)
- DevOpsDays NZ, September 2016
- ManageEngine User Group NZ, August 2016 (speaker)
- itSMFnz New Zealand, July 2016 (speaker)
- ITx New Zealand, July 2016 (speaker)
- Pink Elephant 20th Annual International IT Service Management Conference, USA, February 2016 (Think Tank workshop, 4x speaker, and half-day workshop)
- itSMF Australia National Conference 2015 (workshops and hypothetical)
- itSMF New Zealand National Conference, 2015 (keynote)
- Pink Elephant 19th Annual International IT Service Management Conference, USA, February 2015 (Think Tank workshop, 2x speaker, and half-day workshop)
- ISACA Security Day, Wellington, 2014 (keynote)
- ITx Conference Auckland (2 presentations)
- AgileNZ Conference 2014 (presentation)
- Pink Elephant 3rd Annual ITSM Leadership Forum, USA, 2014 (presentation and panels)
- itSMF Australia LEADit National Conference, August 2014 (keynote, hypothetical, presentation)
- itSMF New Zealand National Conference, 2014 (keynote, panel, presentation)
- Pink Elephant 18th Annual International IT Service Management Conference, USA, February 2014 (Think Tank workshop, 2x speaker, and half-day workshop)
- LEADit 2013, itSMF Australia, Canberra, August 2013
- ITIL Forum in Sarnen, Switzerland in June 2013
- SDI 2013 in Birmingham, UK in June 2013
- itSMF New Zealand National Conference, May 2013
- Service Manager Dag, 25th April 2013, Utrecht, Netherlands. (Virtual appearance)
- NZ National DevOpsDay, Auckland, March 2013 (speaker)
- Pink Elephant 17th Annual International IT Service Management Conference, Las Vegas, February 2013 (5x speaker)
- ISACA Oceania CACS, Wellington, September 2012 (keynote speaker)
- itSMF Australia National Conference, August 2012 (keynote speaker and workshop)
- itSMF New Zealand National Conference, June 2012 (keynote speaker and panelist)
- CCLearning Prince2 Conference, Wellington, May 2012 (speaker)
- ManageEngine User Conference, Sydney, April 2012 (keynote speaker)
- ManageEngine User Conference, Melbourne, April 2012 (keynote speaker)
- Pink Elephant 16th Annual International IT Service Management Conference, Las Vegas, February 2012 (2x speaker and 2x panel discussions)
- itSMF Australia National Conference, August 2011 (keynote speaker and “hypothetical”)
- itSMF New Zealand National Conference, June 2011 (keynote speaker, voted best speaker)
- itSMF Canada NCR, Professional Development, May 2011 (speaker and workshop)
- itSMF Denmark National Conference, May 2011 (keynote speaker)
- Pink Elephant 15th Annual International IT Service Management Conference, Las Vegas February 2011 (speaker and workshop)
- CCLearning Prince2 Conference, Wellington 2010 (keynote speaker)
- itSMF Australia National Conference, Melbourne 2010 (keynote speaker)
- itSMFnz National Conference, Auckland 2010 (speaker)
- Pink Elephant 14th Annual International IT Service Management Conference, Las Vegas 2010 (speaker and workshop)
- SPUSC (South Pacific Universities IT Service), Wellington 2009 (keynote speaker)
- itSMF New Zealand, Wellington 2009 (speaker)
- ISO Corporate Governance of IT (international), Wellington 2008
- itSMF Thailand, Bangkok 2008 (speaker)
- itSMF Asian Summit, Singapore 2008 (speaker)
- BrightStar Best Practices, Auckland 2008 (speaker)
- itSMF Best Practices, Netherlands 2008 (keynote speaker)
- itSMF New Zealand, Wellington 2006 (speaker)
Articles
(Rob has published some of these articles under the pseudonym of The IT Skeptic)
- Twelve Tips for Managing Geeks Datamation
- How Secure is Your IT Technical Career? IT Career Planet
- Seven Steps for Helping Geeks Grow IT Career Planet
- People, Practices, Things bITaPlanet
- Inside the Geek IT Career Planet
- Strategies For Securing Your IT Career IT Career Planet
- How an IT Guy Found Job Freedom IT Career Planet
- Geeks and the Meaning of Life IT Career Planet
- When Will Technology Make Life Simpler? Datamation
- Who Pays For On-the-Job Training? IT Career Planet
- Stop Calling ITIL Best Practice ITSMWatch
- What You need to know about ITIL Compliant ITSMWatch
- ITIL Must Embrace the Collective ITSMWatch
- ITIL Business Case 101 ITSMWatch
- What Goes into an ITIL Business Case ITSMWatch
- There is No Evidence for ITIL ITSMWatch
- Cooperation Between Vendors Over CMDB? ITSMWatch
- The Pillars of ITIL ITSMWatch
- The Success of Mediocrity in IT IT Career Planet
- Service Catalogue is the Center of the ITSM Universe ITSMWatch
- The (Belated) Rise of IT Professionalism IT Career Planet
- ITIL Version 3 Service Strategy: An Early Review bITaPlanet
- Tireless Innovation: Training the IT Way IT Career Planet
- ITIL v3: Passing the Skeptic's Test bITaPlanet
- When 'Best' is Too Good bITaPlanet
- The IT Skeptic Comes Clean ITSMWatch
- APMG ITIL Exams Getting Dumbed-Down ITSMWatch
- ITIL v3: What’s the Rush? ITSMWatch
- A Completely Unauthorized Biography - Part I: A History of ITIL ITSMWatch
- ITSM: The Good, The Bad and The Ugly (Truth) ITSMWatch
- I Saw It On a Screen So It Must Be True! Datamation
- Project Managers are a Breed Apart Project Manager Planet
- What Shape Are You? IT Career Planet
- Silence is Not Assent: do your project justice. Project Manager Planet
- The Commoditization of the Tech Professional IT Career Planet
- A CMDB Can Be Done But Would You Want To ITSMWatch
- Avoiding “Dead Cat Syndrome” Project Manager Planet
- The Evolution of the ITIL Request ITSMWatch
- So You Want To Be An IT Consultant IT Career Planet
- Getting the Most from Your PM Service Provider Project Manager Planet
- Community, Activity, Environment bITaPlanet
- Book Review: Passing Your ITIL Foundation Exam ITSMWatch
- Succeed In IT By 'Reading' People IT Career Planet
- The Rise of Governance and Assurance bITaPlanet
- Just What is an ITIL Service Anyway? ITSMWatch
- What ITIL Means by "Process" ITSMWatch
- What Governance Isn’t Novatica/CEPIS UPGRADE
- Get The Business, Or Get Out Of The Business IT Career Planet
- The End of IT Worker Servitude IT Career Planet
- Ten Things They Don't Want You to Know About ITIL v3 ITSMWatch
- Internet, I Gave You The Best Years Of My Life IT Career Planet
- How Software Vendors Lie About ITIL Support ITSMWatch
- Tripping Out On Small-Business ITIL bITaPlanet
- ITIL Ain’t Folksy Anymore ITSMWatch
- On Demand Data and the CMDB ITSMWatch
- ITIL is Cultural Not Technical ITSMWatch
- The Four Big Questions ITIL Doesn’t Answer ITSMWatch
- Understanding the Cloud/Ops Disconnect ITSMWatch
- Managing Your Boss: Your Biggest Job IT Career Planet
- The (Ongoing) Evolution of the ITIL Request ITSMWatch
- Cooperation Between Vendors Over CMDB? Still waiting ITSMWatch
- Migration Isn't the Only Obstacle to Cloud Computing CIO Update
- What ITIL Doesn’t Cover ITSMWatch
- IT Teachers Suck ITCareerPlanet
- ITIL Foundation Exams Don't Test Understanding ITSMWatch
- Teaching Adults (Yes, It's Different) ITCareerPlanet
- How to Fix the ITIL v3 foundation Exams ITSMWatch
- ITIL v3: Still No Rush ITSMWatch
- ITIL Still Needs to Embrace the Collective ITSMWatch
- Kill Projects that Don’t Put People First Project Manager Planet
- Delivering Training to Adults ITCareerPlanet
- ITIL v3: Service Catalog Should be Front and Center ITSMWatch
- Practical Techniques for Training Adults ITCareerPlanet
- When projects are only half done Project Link
- Using Balanced Metrics as Service Support Indicators ITSMWatch
- Have the Pillars of ITIL Crumbled Further? ITSMWatch
- The Project Skeptic: IT has paid its dues Project Link
- The role of ITIL in managing IT risk and compliance TechDay ITBrief
- The Project Skeptic: How IT project management is different Project Link
- Asking the Hard Questions: The ITIL® Update The lead article in the inaugural edition of itSMF International's magazine, At Your Service
- What is Service Management ITSM Review
- What is a Service Catalogue ITSM Review
- What is a Technical Service Catalogue ITSM Review
- The People in ITSM ITSM Review
- Incident Management at Cherry Valley, Illinois ITSM Review
- Better Process Can Be Better Business Beetil
- Service Management Success: Delivering to Your Customers Beetil
- Responding to requests – Sensible service management Beetil
- Responding to Incidents – Sensible Service Management Beetil
- Dealing with Major Incidents – Sensible Service Management Beetil
- Problem Management – Sensible Service Management Beetil
- Ode to a Project Manager Project Link
- Problem Management Defined ITSM Review
- Eating Ourselves Project Link
- Proactive Problem Management ITSM Review
- Service Portfolio Versus Programme and Project Portfolio Project Link
- Root Cause – Railways don’t like derailments ITSM Review
- Service Improvement at Cherry Valley ITSM Review
- Everything is improvement ITSM Review
- BAU improvements ITSM Review
- Customers are not your top priority ITSM Review
- What’s the big idea? ITSM Review
- Shadow IT Article for LanDesk book
- Is ITSM SaaS Overrated? CA Technologies
- The Reality of Real IT CA Technologies
- Why You Want Your IT Organization to Be An Agile Mule CA Technologies
Websites
Blogging
- Rob has done a series of posts over several years for the Pink Elephant ITSM Conference Blog
- A series of posts for the Beetil blog on Sensible Service Management for Small-to-Medium-Enterprises
- And of course Rob's popular and controversial blog is The IT Skeptic, now into its ninth year, with tens of thousands of visitors each month and a Google Page Rank varying between 4 and 5.
Other sites
Rob's growing portfolio of websites is here.
Some selected content from the websites:
He Tangata
He Tangata is about putting people first in IT. Not technology or process. If we put people first we can achieve efficency and effectiveness. We can transform our processes and improve our technology and leverage our partners. More projects will succeed and more will stay succcessful without backsliding over time. If we put people first.
Real ITSM
In order to regulate the Real ITSM industry, and thereby protect the integrity of RITSI and public confidence in Real ITSM, RITSI issues compliance certification to users, products, and services under the FavorITSM program. Other frameworks have sadly neglected the revenue potential of such compliance certification, and have left it open to foraging commercial entities. RITSI has no intention of making the same mistake, although for a suitable consideration from an interested party we could conceivably reconsider this policy.
[Before you write to me, it's satire]
The CoPr Manifesto
Core Practice is business management information provided free, in the public domain, contributed by the community. We believe this is a revolutionary concept: Core Practice seeks to change the world.
About Core Practice
Not everyone can afford or wants best practice. We fully support best practices for those organisations that have the commitment and resources and reason to adopt best practice. For those who do not, something more pragmatic is required, which can be distilled from best practice as well as from legislative requirements and other sources. For these organisations (e.g. small businesses, start-ups, the cash-strapped) there is Core Practice. “If you do nothing else, do these things.”
We have a teapot
In the kitchen cupboard is a teapot. A nice simple white china teapot. I drive the economy by not using it.
The first principle of getting rich is to not be directly involved
There are people who get rich on their own time: lawyers and media stars spring to mind. But the first group have to be really smart, and work really hard for years; and the second group have to be born with some talent and then get really lucky or sleep with the right people. Either way it is hard to arrange, so keep your hours out of it.
ITIL’s dead elephant: CMDB can't be done
CMDB can’t be done. Not as ITIL defines it. At least not with a justifiable return on the investment of doing it - it is such an enormous undertaking that any organisation attempting it is going to burn money on an irresponsible scale. The truth about CMDB is no secret. It is a “dead elephant”: a great putrescence in the corner of the room that everyone studiously ignores, stepping around it and ignoring the stench, because life will be so much simpler if they do not acknowledge the obvious.
Debasement of concepts by IT vendors and analysts
The persistent erosion of meaning in IT terminology is a damaging practice endemic across vendors and analysts. When a concept gains some currency and everyone wants it, suddenly all the vendors have got it - often by re-labelling a feature of their existing product. And the analysts keep confusing the definition so no-one can call the vendors out for this obfuscation. I used to really struggle with this. I thought I kept getting the wrong end of the stick with new terminology, until I realised that is was other people moving the stick.
efficiency and effectiveness
Always remember that costs can be cut in two ways: by concentrating on efficiency or effectiveness. We often spend too much time on the former, and sometimes even reduce the latter.
The 7 Top Reasons Why You Can’t Quit Your Job
You are worried about not knowing what will happen to you. You can drive half-a-ton of steel at sixty miles an hour inches away from other vehicles, and trust their drivers to do the same. You can purchase and eat food that you didn’t see being cooked. You can enter a convenience store after nightfall. You regularly plug and unplug cables carrying 120 volts (or 240 volts) of lethal electricity. Heck, you pipe the stuff through a pad in your bed. But changing jobs is really dangerous.
Every good boy deserves men
Somewhere around teenage, almost all boys switch from "My Dad can beat your Dad" to "My Dad is an idiot" (that is, if their father is still around at that point). Disillusioned when they discover he is not in fact superhuman, they reject their father, and especially his advice. (Actually I know a certain eight-year-old boy who doesn't give much credence to his father's advice already).