If anyone has an SLA for applications please send it to me. I need something to work with. I've read the books (what there is of them) and still am confused about what an optimal applications SLA would include - especially the metrics.

Thanks in advance,

Mike

-- Mike (m@osmc-web.com), November 13, 2000

Answers

Mike,

Did you check out the short form SLA at this website under Templates? I think that is a very straight-forward template for a basic SLA. One of the common mistakes that I have seen service providers make, is that they assume the longer the SLA the better. I think a basic SLA should include the principals below:

- it must define the service and describe the operating environment - it must use meaningful and understandable guidelines for measurement and these should be in layman's terms - it should include at least one metric in each of the four main areas: AVAILABILITY(perhaps a transaction that opens the application and sees if a form is displayed back from the application), PERFORMANCE (perhaps a response time metric that counts the number of seconds of elapsed time for a common business transaction), THROUGHPUT (perhaps tracking the average number of business transactions processed every hour) PROBLEM RESOLUTION TIME (tracks the average time it takes to respond and resolve a trouble ticket that is opened) - the SLA should clearly state the roles and responsibilities of parties that are working with the SLA on both the customer and the service provider sides - the SLA should clearly state the process by which the SLA will be updated (ie when a condition changes on the SLA) and how often it will be regularly reviewed and the parties involved on both sides.

If you do this, you will have the basic tenants of a solid SLA. If you want to do even better, find a way to allow the customer to view the status of the SLA through a web-based reporting interface.

Hope this helps and good luck,

Mary Nugent VP & General Manager Service Provider Solutions BMC Software

-- Mary Nugent (mary_nugent@bmc.com), November 21, 2000.