Logical and Physical Network Design

Introduction This paper presents a brief overview of what goes into a attend to direct musical arrangement (SLA) take on. It also presents an spokesperson of unmatchable. Contents This publication contains the avocation topics Topic wherefore Have assist train Agreements? melt off Areas to hit the books weight-lift Comp championnts showcase Of A serve well take aim Agreement bosom See Page 2 3 6 8 -1- Why Have servicing Level Agreements? Rationale SLAs are critical towards formalizing expectations or so helpings with end users and guests. Without these, customer expectations impart assume that everything will be delivered and available at a 100% take aim all(a) the cadence.Very piffling can be done about poor wait on when in that location is no definition what good servicing is. Objectives should be set that outline items such as rejoinder clock, avail capability, turnaround and accuracy. Customers and IT should commit to a reciprocally acceptable me ans of verifying compliance with gain objectives and agree on actions that moldiness(prenominal) take place when exceptions come up. bring up Goals Key goals of downstairstaking adjudge supporter arrangements are as follows Allow for IT to understand customer good hirements. correspond customer expectations for directs of dish out to be delivered. Allow for clear intellectual of priorities when handling function problems. -2- Contract Areas to Consider Overview The pastime section presents a number of break areas to consider when building SLA Contract documents. Level of formalization table service levels whitethorn range from a formalized contract that is sign(a) off by phonation customer departments to informal known levels inbred to IT functions. IT should be aware which level of formalization is appropriate. Ability to Meet inspection and repair Targets IT should ensure that documented levels of service can indeed be met.Targets should entrust for a la titude contingency to cover occasional problems or slowdowns to occur without jeopardizing cans. Within ITIL, availability Management should review planned targets and turn in guidance as to what levels may be appropriate given current IT capabilities. Requirements for immature capabilities should be highlighted to management to checker whether to invest in them or not. train of Customer Expectations Targets should be communicated to customers in terms that make them clearly mum from their scene. This promotes a good level of understanding and cooperation when service problems do occur.Handling SLA Contract lurchs Processes should be in place to handle transposes in service requirements. Customers may wish to carry on better service levels, add new functions that require new levels of service or periodically renew current levels. These should be negotiated through a answer Level Manager and processed via flip Management. Number of SLA Contracts Less is better, more gr eatly increases management overhead to cut through and manage. It may be watch outd to take over a single contract for all departments versus quintuple service contracts for different departments. few other structure may be to ware a base conformity that covers everyone as a oversight with a limited set of overriding contracts for unique needs. proceed on next paginate -3- Contract Areas to Consider, continue Types of dish up Targets to Be acknowledge The types of service targets to be provided should be identify in the service level contract. Examples of types of service targets acknowledge items such as Response Times Availability Windows Equipment Service And Repair Times Technical Support Response and Level Report Or Other Media Delivery Security Access information store and Backup RequirementsDetermining Customer Services It will be requirement to delineate what critical customer workloads are. From this a specific service level can be derived. Workloads can be square offd as one or more customer functions that require service from IT. Examples of these strength include items such as Processing patient accounts in a hospital. entranceway orders from customers on a phone. Accessing E-Mail. Retrieving and creating memos. Each of the above apply an associated level of service that allows that function to be accomplished successfully.This level big businessman include availability of service to that function. (i. E-Mail will be available from 8AM to 9PM on week sidereal days). It magnate also include a level of response. (i. e Order doorway transactions on a terminal must provide a response time less than 5 seconds 85% of the time). Most organizations have found it helpful to implement an ITIL Service compose to better define what these service are. With this, the SLA contract would only need to reference those service expositions. The Catalog can also serve to centralize all of these definitions in one place. Multiple Tar gets For Services It may in demand(p) to provide or negotiate multiple service levels for a single customer service.An example of this might be negotiating a lower response time for peak hours of the day and a higher response time at other hours. Another example might be provision of high availability all the time but specific functions or files may be unavailable at certain times of the day. go on on next scalawag -4- Contract Areas to Consider, Continued cloture of Service Disputes It may be desired to put a process in place that fairly identifies resolutions to problems or misunderstandings in service expectations. This may be a committee of representative Customer and IT personnel without a direct interest in the problems under discussion.Operational Level Agreements and Underpinning Contracts In an environment where the service to be delivered is provided by multiple departments, organizations or outside vendors, service boundaries must be clearly defined. This identifies w here responsibilities fabrication and what kinds of services have to be delivered by apiece service speech communication entity. An example of this might include a client/server architected cover where end user response time service consists of both chief(prenominal)frame computer processing and server/front-end processing. If these two components are managed by ifferent organizations, then each organization should set up an operational level agreement.As an example of the above, mainframe response time targets will be under 5 seconds 85% of the time, server processing will be under 3 seconds 80% of the time. This would result in the actual service level to the customer of a response time less than 8 seconds 80% of the time. Service Targets essential Be Reportable either service level that is set must be able to be adequately reported on. It would be inconstant to establish a service level for which monitoring data cannot be collected.The operational efforts and costs invo lved with monitoring and reporting on each given service level should be taken into account when that level is set. -5- Contract Components Overview A Service Level Contract is a key component of a formalized service level agreement process. Key components of this document are stringd in this section. Contract Dates Starting and close dates that the contract is to be in force. If ending dates are specified, new service level agreements may have to be created for projects or departments that function beyond the end dates. Contract NumbersThese may be necessary if negotiating multiple contracts. They precisely identify specific contracts. Customer Identification Identifying information that describes the group of users who are included within the scope of the contract. Demand Periods It is helpful to identify periods of time in which types of use are likely to make the greatest service demands on processing resources. Some targets may differ depending on demand periods. For exampl e, an E-Mail service may have a lesser target for response time during the start of work when most employees retrieve their messages.There may be a higher target for slower periods later in the day. Project or Departmental Description A brief description of the department or project to be serviced. This may include its main purpose or business function and how processing supports the goals of that entity. Expected Service Requirements A description in clear concise terms of the service level targets to be delivered by IT to support the department(s) or project(s) covered by the service contract. These should be in business terms and from the customer perspective as much as possible. Continued on next paginate -6-Contract Components, Continued Service Assumptions If needed, this section can be included to describe any service assumptions used to support the service levels being delivered. Examples might include A set number of customer users not to be exceeded Specific IT capaciti es that might incur additional costs if exceeded Allowances for special times of the day, week, month or year Target Calculations Methodologies or calculations used to determine service expectations should be documented. The purpose is to clearly state how service levels may be calculated, measured and reported on.IT Charging Costs Any assumptions or pass judgment costs of delivering the service should also be documented. Determination of costs is help by the Capacity Planning and Financial Management processes. In some cases, it may be necessary to include a sample charging bill. Contract Maintenance This section should describe the conditions under which the contract should be changed. It should identify who is obligated for reporting on the quality of service delivered and how service disputes may be resolved. Contract ResponsibilitiesThis section should identify organizations or personnel responsible for support activities related to Contract Maintenance, Service Level Repor ting, Service Level Dispute Resolution and Renegotiation of Service Levels. Signature Block This section provides situation for Customer and IT sign-off to the terms in the contract. -7- Example Of A Service Level Agreement Contract Introduction The following pages present one example of a comprehensive Service Level Agreement contract. This example is belike much more formalized than necessary but illustrates some of the concepts discussed in this paper. Continued on next page 8- Example Of A Service Level Agreement Contract, Continued returns LEVEL AGREEMENTContract Date Agreement Number Division Location Project Peak Times press release Date This document with attachments specifies the agreement between the above named business building block and the Data Processing Center (DPC) for shared computing services. This agreement consists of the following sections segmentation I portion II Section III Section IV Section V Section VI Services To Be Provided Expected Service Requi rements Service Assumptions Costs Contract Maintenance DPC Responsibilities Section VI Section sevenerCustomer Responsibilities Service Change Control Procedure Section 7I Signatures -9- Continued on next page 10 Example Of A Service Level Agreement Contract, Continued plane section I SERVICES TO BE PROVIDED concern Unit Description, Business Unit Scope And Desired Services to be provided. May provide references to ITIL Service Catalog here. SECTION II EXPECTED SERVICE REQUIREMENTS Examples (May list for each service to be provided or reference ITIL Service Catalog) Response Time Requirements Availability Requirements Report/Media Delivery Requirements Data Retention and Back-Up RequirementsTechnical Support Requirements Job/Report Turnaround Requirements Security Requirements Continued on next page 11 Example Of A Service Level Agreement Contract, Continued SECTION III SERVICE ASSUMPTIONS The services and costs within this agreement are based on the assumptions below. Any a ssumption found invalid could have an effect on ability to meet service targets and/or costs charged for services. Changes to assumptions will be handled in accordance with the Service Change Control Procedure exposit in this agreement. The service assumptions included with this agreement are SECTION IV COSTSCOST FACTOR RULE AND CHARGES APPLIED &8212&8212&8212&8212&8212&8212&8212&8212&8212&8212- Anticipated Costs Per Period &8212&8212&8212&8212&8212&8212&8212&8212&8212-Period 1 Period 2 Period 3 Period 4 Continued on next page 12 Example Of A Service Level Agreement Contract, Continued SECTION V CONTRACT nourishment Terms for Renegotiation Penalties/Rewards Service Level Reporting Responsibilities Service Problem Resolution Responsibilities Continued on next page 13 Example Of A Service Level Agreement Contract, Continued SECTION VI DPC RESPONSIBILITIES DPC will provide IT Service Management to control the services described in this agreement.DPC will appoint a Service Manager who will have responsibility for Coordinating DPC activities and responsibilities to address any service issues that may arise. Interfacing with the customer Service Contact for service issues and requests for service changes. With the customer Service Contact, distribute the Service Change Control Procedure described in this agreement. Delivering service reports to the customer Service Contact. Maintain service communications and reviewing any service improvement actions and progress with the customer Service Contact during execution of this agreement on a regular basis.Continued on next page 14 Example Of A Service Level Agreement Contract, Continued SECTION VI CUSTOMER RESPONSIBILITIES This section identifies the customer responsibilities associated with this agreement. DPCs performance is predicated upon the responsibilities identified below. Prior to the start of this agreement, customer will designate a person, called the Service Contact to whom all DPC communications will be addressed and who has the post to act for customer in all aspects of this agreement.The responsibilities of the Customer Contact include Serve as the interface between DPC and all customer departments act included in the scope of this contract. With the DPC Service Manager, administer the Service Change Control Procedure as described in Section VII of this agreement. Attend service status meetings. Obtain and provide information, data, decisions and approvals, within 3 working days of DPCs request unless DPC and the customer agree to an extended response time. Resolve deviations from service assumptions which may be caused by customer.Help resolve service issues and escalate issues within customers organization, as necessary. The following responsibilities by appropriate customer personnel involved in this project are as follows Continued on next page 15 Example Of A Service Level Agreement Contract, Continued SECTION VII SERVICE CHANGE CONTROL PROCEDURE The following provide s a detailed process to follow if a change to this agreement is required A Request For Change (RFC) will be the vehicle for communicating change.The RFC must describe the change, the rationale for the change and the effect the change will have on the services. The designated contact of the requesting party will review the proposed change and determine whether to submit the request to the other party. The receiving contact will review the proposed change and approve it for further investigation or reject it within third (3) working days. The investigation will determine the effect that the implementation of the RFC will have on service targets, service charges and service assumptions related to this agreement.