What is a Service Level Agreement? Service level agreements are part of a quality approach to help teams identify and agree what ‘good quality’ looks like and provide a framework for measuring and monitoring the success of service quality. A service level agreement is normally a two-way written agreement which defines the service and standards your team provides to your customers whether these are students, staff in schools and/or other central administration teams. It also describes what you need from your customers/service users in order to deliver the service stated.

Benefits of SLAs Facilitates a clear understanding of the service and responsibilities of all parties; Helps you to manage your service users expectations; Promotes transparency, accountability and consistency; Informs team performance, workloads, staffing decisions; Supports cooperative and collaborative working; and Focuses teams on continuous improvement

Why we are introducing SLAs To support the strategic review by providing : ● a standard framework for defining the services provided by central administration to be agreed with its service users ● a set of core and departmental quality standards that are measurable ● clear boundaries and accountabilities ● an opportunity to review and improve our services and demonstrate how we add value and improve cost effectiveness

What has been agreed by SHA: ● The development of departmental and core SLAs for all central administration teams by December 2009 taking into account: ● Service quality, relevance – new ways of working, cost effectiveness, success measures and key performance indicators ● A group of departments will lead on the development consisting of Estates, External Relations, ITS, the Library and Registry ● A standard SLA template has been agreed for use by all teams ● A management consultation group to be established to develop Core SLAs and review departmental SLAs ● Timescales for the development, implementation and evaluation of SLAs with updates and progress reviews by SHA

Timeline for development By June 2009 Lead departments to develop SLAs Management group to develop Core SLAs July 2009 Discussions with Schools to start September 2009 Core SLAs and Lead Department SLAs complete December 2009 All SLAs to be in place

Developing SLAs Start with a plan! Work out the logistics - what needs to be done, when and by whom Decide how you will - communicate, engage and involve your teams Address any resource issues

Review your services What services are provided? What quality standards already exist? Seek feedback from service users Set out what you need from your service users in order to deliver Consider new ways of working

Be prepared to negotiate SLAs need to be agreed not simply defined Don’t get bogged down in detail Service Standards should be SMART – specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, and time based. Who is accountable for service delivery?