Tag Archive for 'cio'

Documenting the (SLA) Service Level Agreement

Published by Nainil Chheda on February 18, 2009 in Organization and Technology. 0 Comments

The most difficult job is being a Network Administrator. The reason is simple:

  1. They have never get credit for what they do
  2. They always have a problem which does not have an easy solution
  3. Everyone complaints that the network performance is slow

Recently I was requested to document the Service Level Agreement (SLA) for our organization. The SLA is intended to provide guidance on how the network and telephony infrastructure is expected to perform, and the Network Team’s commitment to maintaining the quality and reliability of services provided to the enterprise.

The Structure of an SLA can be summarized by:

1.0    Statement Of Intent
1.1    Document Approvals
1.2     Document Review Dates
1.3     Time Conventions

2.0     About This Service
2.1     Services Covered Under This SLA
2.2     User Environment
2.2     User Support Services

3.0     About Service Availability
3.1     Scheduled Events That Impact Service Availability
3.2     Nonemergency Enhancements
3.3     Change Process
3.4     Change Management

4.0     Service Measures

5.0    Network Team Prioritizes

Network SLA cover all services under the administration of the Network Team, and includes, but is not limited to:

  1. Desktop Services
  2. LAN Services
  3. WAN Services
  4. Telephony Services
  5. Backup & Restore
  6. Security
  7. Audit

The SLA is governed by both the response time and the resolution time. Response time does not mean resolution. Response time is the time in which you will be contacted by a IT operations team member to triage/troubleshoot the issue.

Here is how we prioritize requests for support according to the following severity guidelines:

  1. Highest Severity (Response: Within 15 minutes)
    Impacts the whole business unit (Department); Employee Termination; Involuntary Employee Termination; Phone System Affected; etc.
  2. High Severity (Response: Within 1-4 hours)
    Workstation failure; etc.
  3. Normal Severity (Response: Within 2-4 hours)
    Causes partial loss of productivity for an individual user; Cannot Receive Emails; etc.
  4. Low Severity (Response: Within 24-48 hours)
    Hardware Approval; Software Upgrade; Email setup in Blackberry; A user needs administrative assistance; etc.
  5. Very Low Severity (Response: Within 1 week)
    Enhancement requests are logged as Severity 5-Very Low Priority, but are reviewed and scheduled by the Network Team Advisory Board.

For an SLA to be honored the “Technology Resource Utilization Policy” should be used to bring accountability amongst the stakeholders and the Network Team. The purpose of the SLA is to ensure that the proper elements and commitment are in place to provide optimal data processing services for the business function.

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Being Patient with Technology

Published by Nainil Chheda on February 16, 2009 in Human Behaviour and Technology. 0 Comments

Being a CIO, I hear people complaining every hour of the day:

  1. The network performance is too slow
  2. I need more RAM
  3. My emails are not going out
  4. I don’t like being a “Limited User”. Please make me a “Power User”
  5. My computer just froze up

It would be wrong if I mentioned that everything that the members request was invalid.

There have been instances when the Network performance is very slow. It feels as if you can click a button, go to the kitchen and brew coffee. Even after that your page might not load. Some members really need to upgrade their workstation memory as they would have installed some apps which require a higher processing unit.

Even with these experiences, I am not convinced that those who use technology are patient enough to deal with the same. My inclination is toward these examples:

1. As soon as one logins to the computer, the user constantly moves the mouse thinking that the computer might react to the mouse movement and the screen would reflect the users desktop.

What the user is forgetting is that even though he/she is constantly moving the mouse to make the computer react faster, there is an additional level of processing which is consuming the current resources of the workstation. Thus making it even slower.

2. If a user is not able to send an email, he/she directly contacts the Network Admin. They need to do some basic testing which would include:

Check if the internet connection is available

Did you know? Most of the issues in your computer (about 75%) are resolved by just restarting the same.

Everyone wants the information to flow pretty seamlessly to their system. The fundamental fault in this assumption is that there are a number of dependencies which might cause the system/network to fail.

To respect technology is to be patient with the technology. One must not show his/her emotions by being frustraited over a slow network connection or a bad keyboard. They should try to find a solution to the situation by being patient. Technology is there to help and not make life complicated.

My advice to everyone: Be patient with technology and you will find great results with what you are trying to achive.

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