KJ Huang

On June 4, 2026, the ITIL 4 Master badge appeared in my PeopleCert account. When friends hear about it, the first reaction is usually: “Wait, aren’t you a developer?” Yes, I am. And that is exactly why I took this path because, for the past two years, most of my code has been written together with AI. In this article, I want to share the whole journey: why I started, how the certification route works, how I prepared to pass every exam on the first attempt, and why a developer would invest in service management in the AI era. This is the route map I wish I had before starting.

It started with one sentence. My friend Erwin Fei, a senior IT and security executive with many years in IT service management and digital transformation, told me ITIL would be worth a look. To be honest, I was skeptical at first; engineers tend to be allergic to the words “management framework.” Still, I signed up for Foundation. That course changed how I think about how a developer delivers digital value to an organization. In the same classroom I also met Chungan Ke. He encouraged me to complete the whole scheme for a more holistic, quality-driven view of service, and we ended up walking the road to Master together. Having a companion made a huge difference.

One thing many people misunderstand: there is no separate “Master exam.” ITIL 4 Master is awarded once you hold Managing Professional, Strategic Leader, and Practice Manager. My route was seven modules: Foundation, CDS, DSV, HVIT, DPI, DITS, and MSF; passing MSF unlocked both Practice Manager and Master. PeopleCert has since launched ITIL (Version 5). ITIL 4 qualifications remain accepted as prerequisites for advanced Version 5 modules, and an ITIL 4 Master can upgrade through Managing Professional Transition (Version 5), delivered as one course with two exams. That transition path does not remove the normal certification-renewal requirements.

I passed Foundation and all six advanced modules on the first formal attempt. That does not mean every concept was stable from the beginning. In practice, sequencing the Continual Improvement Model was my weakest area. I built a road-trip metaphor for the seven steps, then added one check: identify what the scenario has already completed before choosing the next reasonable step. I kept the rule only after it worked on fresh practice questions. By exam day, the error pattern had already been debugged. The deeper lesson was that familiar keywords could pull me toward an answer before I checked scope and direction. I explain the method in “I Used AI as My Tutor for Six ITIL Exams.”

So why service management, and why now? Because of AI. I ship faster than ever, but I learned that customers do not stay because you ship fast. They stay because someone answers when things break, promises are kept, and the experience holds together. When building becomes cheap, delivering well becomes the scarce skill. Years of working with Yu-kai Chou taught me the same lesson from the experience side; his Digital Convergence Model describes how technology, behavior, and business models converge. As technology converges, the game moves to behavior and experience. ITIL 4 is how I turn that belief into daily practice. I have always described myself as the practitioner who turns concepts into working services. I make ideas real. The Master is not a finish line for me; it means the toolbox is finally complete.

I want to end with thanks: to Erwin Fei for the recommendation that opened this door, to Chungan Ke for walking the whole road with me, and to Yu-kai Chou for years of insisting that experience is what matters. If you are a developer considering service management, do not begin by asking whether you need the Master designation. Pick one service you already deliver and write down its user, value, promise, and owner after failure. That is where service management becomes engineering practice.

Sources and version notes

• PeopleCert: ITIL Master (Version 5) and the ITIL 4 Master upgrade path
• PeopleCert: ITIL FAQ and Version 5 transition options
• PeopleCert: ITIL 4 Master badge prerequisites

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