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WHAT IS BUSINESS SERVICE LEVEL AGREEMENT(SLA)?

13th June 2018 by Srini No Comments
Aproduct or service value is defined by its Utility (fit for purpose) and Warranty(fit for use). Fit for purpose means, service needs to fulfil customer needs, and Fit for value means, service is available when the user wants it.

As discussed in the introduction blog, service providers bundle utility and warranty based on customer preferences and perceptions to achieve a business outcome.

The service providers should ensure that Service Level Agreements(SLAs) are managed and monitored correctly to achieve business outcomes.

Let me do a deep dive into SLA. There are broadly two categories of SLA, as shown in the table above.

  1. Internal Agreements
  2. External Agreements

As shown in the diagram above, the Business Service SLA may support any number of customer and partner SLAs. The SLAs should not be committed to delivering a higher level of service to its customer than defined. The Business SLA document or Customer charter should reflect this and should be approved by business owners of the service. Any risks associated with deviation to the SLA should be recorded as risk, and appropriate Risk Management process should be triggered

The Service Designers should ensure that SLA is based on the performance of the service operating within its agreed and documented parameters such as usage capacity, traffic profile, availability, speed and security. Service utilisation and usage pattern forecasting should be understood properly by service designers to ensure that service is configured and satisfy customer requirements

The Business Service SLAs should meet the Business Service Targets as defined in the Service Design Phase. These targets can be of

  • Service Availability
  • Service Continuity/Disaster recovery
  • Capacity Limitations
  • Service Reliability
  • Serviceability
  • Speed Targets
  • Service Incident Resolution

Also, ensure that Support Requirements are taken care such as

  • Support Hours
  • Planned outage windows for affecting changes
  • Security
  • Incident and Problem Management
  • Complaints and Definition Process
  • Reporting and Service Level Reviews
Quality is more important than quantity. One home run is much better than two doubles.

- Steve Jobs

CONCLUSION

Defining and designing  SLA is one of the critical aspects of any new or existing service. Managing quality is equally important as managing customer expectation in the long run, and this will differentiate the service provider from its competitors.

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