HR Case States Best Practices

[Sierra Plaut]

Hi all!

I'm looking to better understand how other organizations define and use HR case states within ServiceNow, particularly the Suspended state.

Today, our team's definition of Suspended is essentially "waiting on the employee." However, we've noticed that it is sometimes being used as a way to pause or stop SLA tracking rather than specifically indicating that employee action is required.

I'm interested in learning how other organizations approach this.

A few questions for the community:

• How do you define and use your HR case states?
• What is the purpose of your Suspended state?
• Do you distinguish between "waiting on employee" and other types of work pauses (for example, waiting on a vendor, payroll provider, HR partner, or external action)?

I'm also interested in any industry standards, benchmarks, research, or best-practice resources related to HR case state management. I've reviewed several common sources (including Gartner, McLean, and ServiceNow documentation) but haven't found much guidance on how organizations specifically define and govern HR case states. If you've come across useful research, benchmarking studies, conference presentations, customer examples, or other resources, I'd appreciate any recommendations.

Thanks in advance for any insights, lessons learned, or examples you're willing to share!

[Its_Azar]

Hi there  @Sierra Plaut 

keep Suspended focused on the reason work can’t currently proceed, rather than using it just to control SLA tracking. For ex, “Waiting on Employee” could be the main use case, while vendor,HR partner waits could be captured with a separate reason field.

Here the SLA logic much clear. dont create lots of states just for different waiting scenarios.

Suspend and resume an HR case • Australia Employee Service Management • Docs | ServiceNow