---
title: Exploring Service Level Management
description: Use Service Level Management across your organization to monitor and manage the quality of the services.
locale: en-US
canonical_url: https://www.servicenow.com/docs/r/australia/it-service-management/service-level-management/exploring-slm.html
release: australia
product: Service Level Management
classification: service-level-management
topic_type: concept
last_updated: "2026-03-12"
reading_time_minutes: 1
breadcrumb: [Service Level Management, IT Service Management]
---

# Exploring Service Level Management

Use Service Level Management across your organization to monitor and manage the quality of the services.

## Service Level Management overview

Service Level Managers are responsible for negotiating a set of agreements between a service provider and customer that define the scope, quality and speed of the services being provided and ensuring that the agreed service levels are met.

-   **[Service Level Management concepts](https://raw.githubusercontent.com/ServiceNow/ServiceNowDocs/australia/markdown/australia/it-service-management/service-level-management/service-level-management-concepts.md)**  
The ServiceNow® Service Level Management \(SLM\) application facilitates you to oversee and control the services within the organization.
-   **[Define a service contract](https://raw.githubusercontent.com/ServiceNow/ServiceNowDocs/australia/markdown/australia/it-service-management/service-level-management/define-a-service-contract.md)**  
A new table of SLA contracts is provided through the **Service Level Management** > **Service Contracts** module. These contracts group together SLAs that relate to a single vendor or customer, as well as the CIs, locations, groups, users, and child contracts that are related to the contract.
-   **[Service Level Agreement \(SLA\) breakdown definitions](https://raw.githubusercontent.com/ServiceNow/ServiceNowDocs/australia/markdown/australia/it-service-management/service-level-management/sla-breakdown-definition.md)**  
Using SLA breakdown, the service owner or service desk manager can see detailed task ownership and SLA duration related data for any task SLA record associated with a task. This helps determine which teams and users are contributing to SLA compliance.
-   **[Service Level Agreement \(SLA\) processing](https://raw.githubusercontent.com/ServiceNow/ServiceNowDocs/australia/markdown/australia/it-service-management/service-level-management/c_SLAProcessing.md)**  
The SLA engine performs two passes to evaluate SLA definitions and their conditions based on a task.
-   **[SLA timer](https://raw.githubusercontent.com/ServiceNow/ServiceNowDocs/australia/markdown/australia/it-service-management/service-level-management/sla-timer.md)**  
Use the SLA timer component to track the amount of time that is required to complete the task as defined by the matching SLA definition.

**Parent Topic:**[Service Level Management](https://raw.githubusercontent.com/ServiceNow/ServiceNowDocs/australia/markdown/australia/it-service-management/service-level-management/service-level-mgmt-landing-page.md)