Need ITSM guidence

[saikrishna1206]

Hi everyone,

I need some guidance. I’m good with ServiceNow concepts, but I’m struggling with real-time scenarios due to limited hands-on project experience. Because of this, I’m finding it difficult to clear interviews.

Can someone please help me with real-time use cases or scenarios, so I can improve my practical understanding?

Any support or direction would mean a lot. Thank you!

[Dr Atul G- LNG · Accepted solution]

Hi @saikrishna1206 

Being a ServiceNow Trainer, I completely understand your pain. Having knowledge but not getting practical learning or hands-on exposure can really slow you down. I know I might not be able to help fully, but I can definitely suggest something:

1. Make it a habit to spend at least 2–3 hours on the ServiceNow Community.
   Pick the ITSM forum or any other relevant forum and observe what members are asking and how others are responding. This will help you learn both basic concepts and advanced topics.

2. After 1–2 days, start participating and answering questions.
   Don’t worry about whether your answers get accepted or rejected. Just try to help. Through this process, you’ll learn many new ServiceNow concepts naturally.

3. You can also watch my videos on my channel, which might give you additional clarity and guidance.

Thanks @Mohammed8  for tagging me.

[Deepak Shaerma · Accepted solution]

Hi @saikrishna1206 

I completely relate to your situation. What is currently helping you is focusing on specific Business Use Cases rather than just definitions.

Some scenarios I recommend you build in your PDI right now:

1. Date Validation: Build a Catalog Client Script to ensure an "End Date" cannot be before a "Start Date."

2. Auto-Closure: Write a Business Rule that automatically closes child tasks when a parent Incident is resolved.

3. Catalog Item with Flow: Don't just create a form. Create a catalog item (e.g., "New Hire Onboarding") and attach a Flow Designer flow that triggers an approval and creates a task.
   
   

Practicing these end-to-end flows will give you the confidence to answer "scenario-based" interview questions and spend sometime on community here to get real-time scenarios is to look at what people are asking right here on the Community!

If you follow these things, you will have solid stories to tell in your next interview. Good luck!

Happy to help! If this resolved your issue, kindly mark it as the correct answer ✅  and Helpful and close the thread 🔒 so others can benefit too.

Warm Regards,

Deepak Sharma

Community Rising Star 2025

[Dr Atul G- LNG · Accepted solution]

Hi @saikrishna1206 

Being a ServiceNow Trainer, I completely understand your pain. Having knowledge but not getting practical learning or hands-on exposure can really slow you down. I know I might not be able to help fully, but I can definitely suggest something:

1. Make it a habit to spend at least 2–3 hours on the ServiceNow Community.
   Pick the ITSM forum or any other relevant forum and observe what members are asking and how others are responding. This will help you learn both basic concepts and advanced topics.

2. After 1–2 days, start participating and answering questions.
   Don’t worry about whether your answers get accepted or rejected. Just try to help. Through this process, you’ll learn many new ServiceNow concepts naturally.

3. You can also watch my videos on my channel, which might give you additional clarity and guidance.

Thanks @Mohammed8  for tagging me.

[Deepak Shaerma · Accepted solution]

Hi @saikrishna1206 

I completely relate to your situation. What is currently helping you is focusing on specific Business Use Cases rather than just definitions.

Some scenarios I recommend you build in your PDI right now:

1. Date Validation: Build a Catalog Client Script to ensure an "End Date" cannot be before a "Start Date."

2. Auto-Closure: Write a Business Rule that automatically closes child tasks when a parent Incident is resolved.

3. Catalog Item with Flow: Don't just create a form. Create a catalog item (e.g., "New Hire Onboarding") and attach a Flow Designer flow that triggers an approval and creates a task.
   
   

Practicing these end-to-end flows will give you the confidence to answer "scenario-based" interview questions and spend sometime on community here to get real-time scenarios is to look at what people are asking right here on the Community!

If you follow these things, you will have solid stories to tell in your next interview. Good luck!

Happy to help! If this resolved your issue, kindly mark it as the correct answer ✅  and Helpful and close the thread 🔒 so others can benefit too.

Warm Regards,

Deepak Sharma

Community Rising Star 2025

[MaxMixali · Accepted solution]

Real-World Scenarios by Module

ITSM - Incident Management

Scenario 1: Auto-Assignment with Workload Balancing Business Need: Incidents need automatic assignment to available agents, but current round-robin creates uneven workload.

Your Solution Should Cover:

• Assignment Rules using Assignment Data Lookup
• Business Rules to check agent availability (active = true, on_call = true)
• Calculate current workload: count active incidents per agent
• Assign to agent with lowest active incident count
• Handle escalation if no agents available
• Update assignment group's manager if unassigned > 30 minutes

Based on my understanding of ServiceNow technical interviews and practical implementation experience, here's comprehensive guidance to help you bridge the gap between concepts and real-world scenarios:

Real-World Scenarios by Module

ITSM - Incident Management

Scenario 1: Auto-Assignment with Workload Balancing Business Need: Incidents need automatic assignment to available agents, but current round-robin creates uneven workload.

Your Solution Should Cover:

• Assignment Rules using Assignment Data Lookup
• Business Rules to check agent availability (active = true, on_call = true)
• Calculate current workload: count active incidents per agent
• Assign to agent with lowest active incident count
• Handle escalation if no agents available
• Update assignment group's manager if unassigned > 30 minutes

Technical Implementation:

javascript

// Business Rule - Before Insert
var gr = new GlideAggregate('incident');
gr.addQuery('assigned_to', 'IN', eligible_agent_list);
gr.addQuery('state', 'IN', '1,2,3'); // New, In Progress, On Hold
gr.groupBy('assigned_to');
gr.addAggregate('COUNT');
gr.query();
// Find agent with minimum count

Scenario 2: SLA with Multiple Conditions Business Need: SLA should pause during vendor waiting time, restart when vendor responds, and escalate differently for VIP users.

Your Solution:

• SLA Definition with pause conditions
• Workflow/Flow to detect vendor communication
• Business Rule to track vendor response timestamps
• Conditional escalation based on user VIP status
• Email notifications at 50%, 75%, 100% breach

---

Service Catalog

Scenario 3: Multi-Level Approval with Dynamic Approvers Business Need: Laptop requests need approval from direct manager, then IT manager, but only if cost > $1500. For executives, skip IT manager approval.

Your Solution:

• Catalog Item variables for laptop selection with pricing
• Flow Designer approval flow with conditions
• Script to get user's manager: g_form.getReference('requested_for', callback)
• Approval conditions checking requested_for.vip field
• Catalog Client Script to show/hide cost warnings

Scenario 4: Variable Dependencies with Complex Logic Business Need: Software request form where "Software Type" determines which "Version" options appear, and "Installation Type" (Local/Cloud) shows different additional variables.

Your Solution:

• Catalog Client Script (onChange) for Software Type
• Filter Version choices dynamically using g_form.clearOptions() and g_form.addOption()
• Show/hide Installation Location based on type
• Variable Sets for reusable cloud configuration options
• Order Guide if bundling multiple software requests

---

CMDB

Scenario 5: Automated CI Relationship Discovery Business Need: When a new application CI is created, automatically discover and create relationships to dependent database servers and web servers.

Your Solution:

• Business Rule on cmdb_ci_appl (After Insert)
• REST API integration to discovery tool
• Parse JSON response to identify dependencies
• Create CI Relationship records (cmdb_rel_ci)
• Update CI with discovery timestamp
• Email notifications for failed discoveries

---

Integration Hub

Scenario 6: Employee Onboarding with Multiple Systems Business Need: When HR approves new hire in Workday, automatically create accounts in Active Directory, assign laptop in asset management, create ServiceNow user, send welcome email.

Your Solution:

• REST Spoke to Workday (inbound webhook)
• Active Directory Spoke for user creation
• Flow Designer to orchestrate:
  • Create sys_user record
  • Trigger laptop request RITM
  • Create accounts in order (AD first, then email)
  • Error handling for each step
  • Rollback logic if any step fails
• Store transaction IDs for audit

[Uncle Rob]

Any example you'd get is JUST applying ServiceNow build concepts to the ITSM context.
So its far more important that you understand the ITSM context.
A great foundation for this is ITIL.  ITIL is actually a library of books but there's a preposterous amount of free content about it online that you could come up to speed quickly.