What is the difference between SLA and Scheduled job

[Krithika R]

Help please

[Sai Shravan]

Hi @Krithika R,

SLA (Service Level Agreement) and Scheduled Job are two different concepts in IT service management.

A service Level Agreement (SLA) is a contract between an IT service provider and a customer that defines the level of service that the customer can expect. SLAs are used to establish and manage expectations for the delivery of IT services, and to ensure that the service provider is meeting the agreed-upon levels of service. The SLA typically includes details such as response times, resolution times, and availability for different types of incidents and service requests.

An SLA can be set up for different types of services, such as:

• Incident management: defines the response and resolution times for different types of incidents
• Problem management: defines the time it takes to identify and resolve problems
• Change management: defines the time it takes to review and approve changes to the IT infrastructure
• Service request management: defines the time it takes to fulfill service requests, such as password resets or hardware requests.

SLA's can be used to measure the performance of an IT service or support team and to help identify areas where improvements are needed. They can also be used to track compliance with regulatory or industry standards, and to ensure that the service provider is meeting the needs of the customer.

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Scheduled jobs are used to automate repetitive tasks, such as data cleanup, data archiving and reporting. They can be set up to run on a specific schedule, such as daily, weekly, or monthly, or they can be triggered by specific events or conditions.

Scheduled jobs can be used for various purposes such as:

• Data cleanup: Clearing old or unnecessary data from the system
• Data archiving: Moving data from a production system to an archive system
• Reporting: Generating and distributing reports on a regular schedule
• Backup: Backing up data on a regular schedule
• Maintenance: Running maintenance tasks on a regular schedule.

You can find more details on Service Level Agreement (SLA) and Scheduled Job in the ServiceNow documentation:

SLA : https://docs.servicenow.com/en-US/bundle/tokyo-it-service-management/page/product/service-level-mana...

Scheduled Jobs: https://docs.servicenow.com/en-US/bundle/tokyo-platform-administration/page/administer/reference-pag...

Kindly mark Correct and Helpful if this helps you in understanding.

[Community Alums]

Hi @Krithika R ,

These two terms are completely unrelated !! No connections at all.

In a layman's language:

SLA is a agreed agreement between two parties that one will do a job within a particular time.

Scheduled job is something which runs again and again to meet a certain goal.

[SoniaShridhar13]

@Krithika R SLA - https://www.servicenow.com/products/itsm/what-is-sla.html#:~:text=A%20service%20level%20agreement%20...

Schedule Job - Scheduled Jobs are pre-programmed tasks that can be completed at a specified time or on a recurrent basis.

The following types of tasks can be automated:
– Automatically generate and distribute a report
– Automatically generate and schedule an entity of records, such as an incident, change item, configuration item, from a template
– Run scheduled jobs from scripts or business rules
– Scheduling at the end of the month
– Scheduling for weekdays
Scheduled job states

A scheduled job can be in any one of the following states.

Ready
Job is ready to run at the next scheduled interval.
Running
Job is in the process of carrying out a task.
Queued
Job has been added to the scheduler queue and is waiting to run.
Error
Error occurred while running the job.
Create a scheduled job
Create a scheduled job on the Schedule Job [sysauto] table.