Image source: ServiceNow
- Challenges in ITSM :
IT Service Management (ITSM) is rapidly becoming a forerunner of digital IT transformation. Businesses have always relied on IT services to run their day-to-day operations, but ITSM now faces the challenge of creating, customizing, and delivering IT- services faster than the speed of business. With real-time, transparent visibility into service performance, It can proactively solve problems and move the business forward. Here comes the Performance Analytics for that issues.
- What is Performance Analytics :
ServiceNow Performance Analytics is a tool for improving organizational performance and delivering successful service delivery by utilizing industry-leading metrics and benchmarks. It has excellent advanced reporting capabilities, which we can use to generate a data visualization.
- Plugins and Activation of Performance Analytics :
Name: Performance Analytics - Premium
ID : com.snc.pa.premium
Fig.Performance Analytics Application Installation
The Performance Analytics - Premium plugin includes the following features:
Create indicators, breakdowns, widgets, and other records
Create interactive filters and use interactive analysis
Create text analytics widgets
Use Performance Analytics with external data
Preserve scores longer than 180 days
Create in-form analytics
Use a Microsoft Excel data source as part of the Report Designer report creation workflow
Schedule Scorecard export to PDF
NOTE: According to ServiceNow Performance Analytics licenses are required to activate licensed Performance Analytics plugins on production instances. Licenses are not required to activate Performance Analytics plugins on a development or test instance.
- Features of Performance Analytics :
- KPIs and dashboards
It has a KPI feature to measure various kinds of KPIs and great visualization of KPIs and graphs on the Dashboard. - Real-time visibility
It will give you real-time trends and graphs of data to make the decisions. - Spotlight
Focus teams on what they should prioritize, using business requirements to rank tasks or records. - KPI signals
Get automatic alerts about anomalies that can impact service delivery—available in Agent Workspace. - Analytics Hub
View trends, predictions, breakdowns, and associated records for detailed performance analysis. - Trusted information
Use real-time, in-platform data as your single source of truth—not scattered info sources. - Bring-your-own data
Get the full picture by blending in-platform results with Excel worksheets or JDBC data sources. - Security and scale
Rest easy while data stays secure, scales automatically, and permissions apply across the platform.
- Indicators in Performance Analytics :
Indicators are a source of data and perform operations on data.
It is a direction of indicating whether data is going upside or downside.
It has its predefined units e.g. Days, Hours, Months, Quarters, Percentages, etc.
- Types of Indicators:-
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- Automated Indicators :
- Automated Indicators are having data sources associated with them.
- The data is collected from tables with various conditions applied to it.
- If the data needs complex operations to perform then there is an option to write a script as well.
- These are the most frequently used indicators in the system to collect the data.
- Manual Indicators :
- The manual indicators are not like Automated indicators. It doesn't have a data source associated with it.
- We have put manual data entries and populated these indicators by adding scores to the scoresheet manually.
- Formula Indicators :
- Formula indicators are used if we want to perform operations on 2 different indicators results.
- Create a formula indicator in these cases:
- To calculate a score from multiple indicators, such as the average of two indicators.
- To extract a calculated value of an indicator from the Analytics Hub and perform operations on that value.
- To measure the gap to the overall target of multiple, combined indicators (an index indicator).
- Automated Indicators :
2. Breakdowns:-
-
- Breakdowns are used to divide data based on parameters.
- If we want to get the data based on Configuration Item then we can create a breakdown for the configuration item and assign that to the indicator so that it will differentiate the values based on configuration items.
- Performance Analytics Live Example :
Problem Statement :
Calculate the Mean Time Between Failure (MTBF) for the configuration item for which the outage is created on last month.
Formula to calculate MTBF : (Total Days in last month - Total Down Duration for Particular CI on last month) / (Number of occurrences for the outage on last month)
(Note: The formula is only for demonstration purposes, it is not an official one).
Implementation Steps:
- Create Indicator Source :
Specify the fact table- It is the source table from where we are getting the data.
In our case it is 'cmdb_ci_outage' table.
We can specify the condition at the indicator source level as well but then it restricts the source for that particular indicator so it is better to specify the filter condition at the Indicator level. In that way, we can use the Indicator source for multiple indicators.
Fig. Indicator Souce Creation
2. Create Automated Indicator :
Specify the Name, Direction, and Unit for the Indicator. The Description field will be auto-generated when you save the form.
You can also specify the precision for that particular unit value. Unit defines the output value formate. In this case, it is days so it is a numeric value.
Fig. Automated Indicator Configuration
Specify the indicator source which we created in the first step.
The aggregator is the same as that of the normal reporting tool aggregator but when you select any aggregator other than 'Count' then it makes visible the field as scripted. If we tick that option then it will allow us to make complex calculations on the values which are coming from Indicator Source Table.
In this case, we are using the OOB table column 'Duration' for calculation purposes.
Fig. Automated Indicator Source Configuration
Specify the Additional Condition as we only want the data from the last month.
Fig. Additional Conditions in Automated Indicator
3. Create Breakdown for Configuration Item :
Search Breakdown in application navigator -> Create New
Fig. Breakdown Module
Configure the new Breakdown as below :
In Link to indicator select the newly created indicator.
Fig. Breakdown Configuration
4. Create the Scheduled Data Collection job :
Every indicator must have 2 jobs associated with it. one is On Demand for historical data collection run only once when we implement or move the PA customization to different instances and 2nd one is for daily data collection.
By default when we create the breakdown then the one temporary job will get created we can use that On Demand for historical Data collection.
Now we can create one job for daily data creation as below :
Fig. Daily Data Collection Job
5. Create Automated Indicator to get the Count of Outages for last month :
Specify the same source as we specify for the 1st Automated indicator.
In source instead of sum aggregator use count as an aggregator.
Assigned the same 2 scheduled jobs for this indicator as well in the related list of jobs.
Assigned the same breakdown which we created earlier for this indicator as well.
Specify the additional condition as created on last month.
Fig. Indicator for Count of record
6. Create Formula Indicator to perform the calculation on the above two indicators.
Write down the formula to calculate the MTBF in the formula field.
Here we are using the two indicator values to evaluate the end result.
You can use the 'browse indicator' option mentioned below the formula text box to get the proper name of the indicator in the formula text box.
Specify the same breakdown for the formula indicator as well.
Fig. Formula Indicator
7. Create a Widget for the formula Indicator :
Form Application Navigator type Widget -> Select Widget Under Performance Analytics and Create Configuration for a widget like below image.
Specify formula indicator and Breakdown in the Indicator and Breakdown Field Respectively.
Select the proper visualization which you want by default when the dashboard loads.
You can specify the Sort direction and Colors as well for the visualization.
Fig. Widget For Formula Indicator
8. Create Dashboard for Widget :
Create a new dashboard and Click on the plus icon to add that widget to the Dashboard.
Select the widget category as Performance Analytics and type the widget name in the search box.
You will get that widget name inside the Breakdown.
Fig. Adding Widget to Dashboard
Click on Add button to get it displayed on the dashboard.
Fig. Adding Widget to Dashboard
Fig. Actual Dashboard for MTBF
You can change the Visualization from the option above to a different format. It is having below Options:-
Fig. Different Visualization Options in Dashboard
- Performance Analytics OnDemand Course:-
Performance Analytics (PA) Fundamentals On Demand (San Diego)
This is all about Performance Analytics from my side. hope it helps you in your implementation.
We will discuss more about advanced scripting options from automated indicators in upcoming blogs. Thanks for reading my blog.
Please mark my Blog as helpful and bookmark it for your future reference.
Regards,
Gunjan Kiratkar
Consultant - ServiceNow, Cloudaction
Community Rising Star 2022
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