Don’t be surprised if you’ve never heard of it.

It is, after all, simply a set of books published by a rather unlikely imprint of technology must-reads, the British government. And it’s not as if its name — the Information Technology Infrastructure Library — would catch your eye.

But ITIL, as it’s called, is the spark behind a growing number of IT improvement projects in the U.S. government, with followers in the military, civilian agencies, and many state and local offices. In the technology industry, ITIL’s emphasis on coupling what are typically disconnected IT management routines has been the blueprint for a number of software products and professional services.

It all goes back to the books, the eight titles that methodically describe best practices for keeping IT operations humming and supporting the business processes that rely on them. ITIL’s appeal and value, its proponents say, lie in its avoidance of the fuzzy consultant-speak and all-or-nothing re-engineering agendas that are often the downfall of other improvement schemes.

“When you look at ITIL, it’s really just a collection of IT common sense,” said Andy Atencio, manager of information and technology for Greenwood Village, Colo. “It’s all stuff we knew and said we’d do but never did because no one ever showed us exactly how.”

One example of that IT common sense is tracking help-desk calls for later analysis so employees can identify recurring problems and solve them more quickly. Another example is creating a way to recognize that a rash of problems might be related to a recent software upgrade on a key server.

ITIL might be simple advice, but its application can result in big payoffs. For example, with the help of an ITIL-based consulting service from Microsoft, the Air Force’s Air Combat Command (ACC) has made changes to its IT operations that have increased network availability from a percentage rate in the mid-80s to the high 90s.