Manage your Service Level Agreement Easily through Business Transaction Management

Business Transaction Management – An up and Coming Paradigm in Systems and Application Performance Management

Technological environments across businesses are getting more complicated by the day; this is resulting in IT professionals facing a tough time with Service Level Agreements. SLA management is a major part of any IT service management and is required to make sure that applications are available according to the SLA requirements. IT environments are also required to be dynamic and capable of handling the fluctuating demands of business. In such a scenario, it becomes necessary for IT to be aligned with business needs closely. Business Transaction Management (BTM) is a concept which is capable of handling the complexity as well as business requirements of IT. It is hence the first step towards Service Level Management. BTM supports the management of Service Level Agreements in each of the following steps:

Step 1: Reviewing your Existing Services

The first step in effectively managing Service Level Agreement is the review of existing services provided by the business. Business Transaction Management traces all the services provided by the business in the form of business transactions and makes information related to it easily available. Hence, the services provided, resources consumed, users of the services etc. can be accessed through BTM.

Step 2: Negotiations with Clients

Most businesses are unaware of the services levels they provide and most clients are unaware of the service levels they receive. BTM provides in depth data of all service levels and hence makes all metrics available for accurate negotiations.

Step 3: Service Level Management and Monitoring

Service Level Agreements provide the base for the quality and level of IT services. Business Transaction Management assists transaction monitoring in a more efficient way, so that any deviations from the SLA can be monitored before they occur and alerts can be sent out.

Step 4: Implementation of Policies for Service Improvement

Business Transaction Management helps improve the service to be delivered so that the conditions of Service Level Agreements can be met without any omissions or deviations. In addition to SLA reporting, BTM solutions show the breakdown of every business transaction so that service flaws can be identified and improved.

Step 5: Establishment of Priorities

Business Transaction Management helps in establishing priorities by providing valuable metrics like which users are using which specific services and how many times, which services need improvement etc.

Step 6: Service Growth Plans

Business Transaction Management solutions help in making service capacity planning easy by providing resource consumption metrics of services across the servers that are being used. The resources being utilized by each service across all tiers can be seen by IT managers through BTM. According to the data, they can then plan for service growth which can be in line with the Service Level Agreement.

In conclusion, Business Transaction Management makes management of Service Level Agreements easier by:

• Ensuring that Service Level Agreements are achieved within the resources defined by the IT Service Management
• Providing data which helps maintain service catalogs
• Ensuring that IT services are delivered on time and at the right place
• Helping businesses provide cost effective, efficient and timely services