Service Level Management Objectives

Service Level Management (SLM) is the process that is responsible for the overall agreeing and documenting Service Level Targets (SLT) and the responsibilities within Service Level Agreements (SLAs) and Service Level Requirements (SLRs) for every service and related activity within IT.

The SLA is effectively a level of guarantee or warranty with regard to the level of service quality delivered by the service provider for each of the services supplied to the business. The accuracy of the SLAs, SLRs and SLTs and the overall success of SLM is very dependent on the quality of the service portfolio and service catalogue and their contents because they provide the detailed information on the services to be managed within the SLM process.

With that said the purpose of the SLM process is to certify that all current and planned IT services are delivered in accordance with agreed achievable targets. This is normally accomplished by SLM through a continuing cycle of negotiations, agreements, in conjunction with constant monitoring, reporting on and reviewing of actual outcomes with comparison to expected or agreed targets.

The following are detailed objectives of SLM:

Define, document, agree, monitor, measure, report on and review the level of IT services provided and when necessary initiate corrective action.

In conjunction with Business Relationship Management, provide and improve the relationship and communications with all stakeholders.

Ensure that specific, meaningful and measureable targets are established for all IT services.

Monitor and improve customer satisfaction through the practice of continuous quality improvement of services delivered.

Certify that both the the customer and the service provider have a clear and unambiguous expectation of the level of service to be delivered.
Confirm that even when all agreed targets are being met, the levels of services delivered are subject to proactive, cost effective continual improvement.

Comments

Four Service Characteristics

Recently I came across several articles by researchers and experts that laid out definitions and characteristics of services. ITIL provides us with a definition that can help drive the creation of value-laden services: A means of delivering value to customers by facilitating outcomes customers want to achieve without the ownership of specific costs and risks. An area that ITIL is not so clear is in terms of service characteristics. Several researchers and experts put forth that services have four basic characteristics (IHIP): Intangibility—Services are the results of actions not things. They have no physical presence and represent a logical set of elements. One way to think of service is “work done for others.” Heterogeneity—Also known as “variability”; services are unique items because of the mechanisms used to deliver services, which is people. Because the people element adds variability, the service is variable. This holds true, especially for the value proposition—not eve...

What is the difference between Process Owner, Process Manager and Process Practitioner?

This article was originally published in 2015. With the Introduction of ITIL 4, some of the concepts have changed in ways that are described below. ITIL 4 has also introduced new roles, as explained in our blog ITIL 4 and the Evolving Role of Roles . Before we dive into the difference between these roles, let’s first look at a key update in ITIL 4 – the shift from processes to practices. ITIL 4 has evolved to focus on holistic practices vs. isolated processes. By definition, a practice is a set of organizational resources designed for performing work or accomplishing an objective. For example, the purpose of the incident management practice is to minimize the negative impact of incidents by restoring normal service operation as quickly as possible. All organizations recognize the need to allocate resources to the management of incidents and mature their capabilities in that area. In ITIL 4, each practice includes resources based on the four ...

What Is A Service Offering?

The ITIL 4 Best Practice Guidance defines a “Service Offering” as a description of one or more services designed to address the needs of a target customer or group. As a service provider, we can’t stop there! We must know what the contracts of our service offering are and be able to put them into context as required by the customer. Let’s explore the three elements that comprise a Service Offering. A “Service Offering” may include: Goods, Access to Resources, and Service Actions 1. Goods – When we think of “Goods” within a service offering these are the items where ownership is transferred to the consumer and the consumer takes responsibility for the future use of these goods. Example of goods that are being provided in the offering – If this is a hotel service then toiletries or chocolates are yours to take with you. You the consumer own these and they are yours to take with you. ...

Search