Baseline and track performance,

usage KPIs, and metrics

Document last updated in Q3 2020—see the new Performance Management Workbook for the latest content.
 Baseline and track performance, usage KPIs, and metrics
Metrics are essential to measuring progress toward set outcomes. When you baseline and track the right metrics to measure ServiceNow ® performance and adoption, as well as the
amount of value ServiceNow delivers to your business, you can assess whether you’re getting what you expected from your deployment and course correct as needed. Metrics also
help prove that your ServiceNow deployment is supporting business objectives, providing insight into where ServiceNow is generating immediate value to the business and where you
expect to deliver future value.

Insight: Baseline and track performance

There are three things you must get right upfront to effectively baseline and track performance:

1. Understand your objectives and vision for implementing ServiceNow in your organization. Without knowing what end goal you’re trying to measure progress against, your
investments in metrics won’t deliver useful information.  
2. Define the key performance indicators (KPIs), the lagging indicators, that tell you if your ServiceNow implementation is on track and delivering value to the business.
3. Define the diagnostic metrics, the leading indicators, that you and your team can use to predict and diagnose KPI performance and inform course corrections as needed.

Once you’ve defined a set of workable KPIs and metrics, treat their use as a program—one that you update and refine as your business goals and ServiceNow implementation
evolve. 

Key implementation steps

Start Improve Optimize

1. Understand your business 4. Continually improve metrics

2. Define KPIs 3. Define diagnostic metrics 5. Extend metrics usage
objectives tracking

2 © 2020 ServiceNow, Inc. All Rights Reserved.

Step 1: Understand your business objectives
The end goal to baselining and tracking performance is to assess whether you’re on or off track with delivering expected business outcomes. To do this well, it’s important to first
understand your organization’s vision for ServiceNow, the business outcomes you expect to deliver, and the plan for delivering these outcomes over time. This makes it possible to
define a credible set of KPIs that, when used together, can directly measure progress and indicate whether you’re on the path to value. 

Review your ServiceNow vision, business case, and phased
program plan to understand what you’ll need to measure to
reliably track progress toward achieving business value
 Review your documented ServiceNow vision, considering:
 What value you’re trying to deliver to the business using
ServiceNow – For example, it might be modernize service
management to increase the speed of IT.  measure first. For example, you might start by implementing incident management and then change
 The most important thing you need to measure to assess if you’re
supporting the vision – For example, it might be changes in IT
speed.
 Review the ServiceNow phased program plan, considering: 
 The solutions that will be implemented to deliver the business value promised in the business case
for ServiceNow – This lets you know what specific capabilities you need to measure to be able to
comprehensively track progress toward delivering value. For example, you might implement incident
management and change management on ServiceNow to increase how quickly you’re able to manage IT
operations.
 When the solutions will be implemented and in what order – This shows what’s most important to
management. If so, you should focus first on measuring incident management implementation and
performance.

 Review your ServiceNow business case, considering: 

 The business outcomes that were promised in the business case –
This lets you know the degree of improvement needed, such as 10%
increase in IT speed.
 When the business case promises outcomes – This provides a
rough sense of the amount of time you need to measure value. For
example, a 10% increase in IT speed in 18 months.
Practitioner insight: Technical experts often jump directly into defining KPIs that measure how well their
systems perform. While system-level KPIs are an important part of measuring the value that ServiceNow can
deliver, they don’t speak directly to business value, and they overlook the potential for ServiceNow to be a
strategic platform. Take the time upfront to understand business objectives and apply your understanding to
define a comprehensive set of KPIs that both inform technical decisions and measure the value you're
delivering to your business users. 

1. Understand 3. Define 4. Continually 5. Extend

2. Define
Steps your business diagnostic improve metrics metrics
KPIs
objectives metrics tracking usage
3 © 2020 ServiceNow, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
Step 2a: Define outcome KPIs
Defining outcome KPIs (these are the lagging indicators that measure the outcomes delivered by what you’ve implemented on ServiceNow) is an important step in measuring
progress toward a high-level vision. Instead of trying to measure against an abstract business goal, such as a 10% increase in IT speed, you must define KPIs that act as proxies to
measure the many activities that you need to perform to reach that abstract goal. The outcome KPIs, combined with implementation KPIs that tell you if the technology itself is
working well (defined in Step 2b), can help you assess how you’re executing against your vision for ServiceNow.

The Now Platform owner should partner with the strategic governance function to define the outcome KPIs that measure
the value ServiceNow creates against the expected business outcomes (for example, measuring the improvements to incident
management that are helping increase how fast incidents are resolved)
Practitioner insight: The set of outcome KPIs
 Consider the following questions to identify what outcome indicators you need to measure: you need changes depending on what you’re
implementing and what goals you have. To
 How does each solution implemented on ServiceNow contribute to delivering business value, as promised in your business case for select the right metrics, you need to:
ServiceNow?  1. First consider what value you need to
 For example, how does implementing incident management on ServiceNow help you modernize service management to increase IT deliver with each solution implemented on
speed by 10% in 18 months? One potential answer is that Incident management can be more automated and streamlined on ServiceNow, ServiceNow in support of your vision.
which means you can resolve incidents faster with fewer people directly involved in managing the process.  2. Identify what (activity or goal) needs to
 What do I need to measure about the implemented solution, based on how that solution delivers business value?  happen to indicate that you have delivered
 For example, to measure if successfully deploying incident management on ServiceNow helps deliver IT speed by reducing the amount
value needed with each solution.
of time needed to resolve incidents, you need to be able to measure the speed delivered by the deployed solution. 3. Finally, define a well-articulated KPI that
can provide evidence of whether that value
is achieved.

1. Understand your business

Steps 2. Define KPIs 3. Define diagnostic metrics 4. Continually improve metrics tracking 5. Extend metrics usage
objectives

4 © 2020 ServiceNow, Inc. All Rights Reserved.

Step 2a: Define outcome KPIs (Continued)

 Define one to three KPIs per implemented solution that measure how that solution supports
a desired business outcome. Practitioner insight:
ServiceNow Performance Analytics offers over 500
 Consider the key benefit that each implemented solution needs to deliver to enable your different out-of-the-box (OOTB) KPIs that you can
vision, such as speed, cost, quality, etc.
select to track. Once you’ve decided what you need to
 Consider the indicators that you could measure that would tell you how much value the measure, consider how you can use Performance
implemented solution is delivering and helping you enable your vision. Analytics to quickly enable real-time performance
 For example, if you want to increase speed, you can measure reductions in the time it takes for tracking directly on the Now Platform ®.
a process to work from end to end, how long each individual process substep takes, or how
long a critical step in the process takes.
 Define a KPI that will measure this indicator, such as % reduction in the time it takes to
resolve incidents and/or average time to complete each process substep. Practitioner insight: Outcome KPIs should be directly
linked to the business case that was created to justify
your investment in ServiceNow. This business case is
typically based on KPIs that provide measurable
indicators that show if you’re delivering business value.
By tracking these KPIs, you can track if you’re
realizing the value that was projected in the business
case.

* See the appendix for example outcome KPIs by business outcome.

1. Understand your business

Steps 2. Define KPIs 3. Define diagnostic metrics 4. Continually improve metrics tracking 5. Extend metrics usage
objectives

5 © 2020 ServiceNow, Inc. All Rights Reserved.

Step 2b: Define implementation KPIs
Measuring and tracking KPIs provides proof that you’re making progress toward achieving the overall vision for your ServiceNow implementation. Outcome KPIs (defined in Step 2a)
are critical because they help directly measure business outcomes—but to comprehensively track progress, you also need to define implementation KPIs that help you measure whether
you set the technology up correctly, are optimizing system performance, are seeing the usage and adoption you need, and if solutions are implemented well on the platform.

Work with the Now Platform owner, relevant service owners, and process
owners to define implementation KPIs that measure platform performance,
adoption, and solution deployment to indicate if the implementation is
meeting its objectives (for example, technical stability, adoption, etc.)
 Define platform performance KPIs that will measure the quality and
reliability of the Now Platform. Consider using these KPIs:
 % uptime – Measures the percent of time when the Now Platform is in
operation, providing an indicator of how reliable your platform is
 Mean time to repair (MTTR) – Measures the average time it takes to repair the
platform when it goes down, providing a basic measure of how maintainable
and repairable your platform is
 % of incidents resolved within service level agreements (SLAs) – Measures
how reliably you can restore services on the Now Platform within the time
limits you set with platform users in your SLAs
 Define adoption KPIs that will measure how successfully ServiceNow is being adopted in your
organization. Consider using these KPIs:
 # of unique users migrated to platform – Measures how many users have started to use the
Now Platform (adoption)
 # of processes migrated to platform – Measures how many processes have migrated to use the
Now Platform (adoption) 
 Average # of daily uses – Measures how much the processes on the Now Platform are being used
(usage)
 Define solution implementation KPIs that can measure how well each process/service is
implemented on ServiceNow. Consider these:
 Average time to complete the process (or fulfill a request) – Measures process speed to track
improvements in speed over time (for example, improved incident resolution time)
 % process success rate – Measures the quality of your services by tracking how often your processes
work as expected (e.g., change management success rates measure how often your change
management process successfully enacts a change without incident)
 % process availability – Measures how available and reliable your process is for users
 # of users/process owners using the process – Measures adoption for specific services to track
adoption increases or decreases over time

1. Understand your business

Steps 2. Define KPIs 3. Define diagnostic metrics 4. Continually improve metrics tracking 5. Extend metrics usage
objectives

6 © 2020 ServiceNow, Inc. All Rights Reserved.

Step 2c: Set KPI performance goals
Once you’ve defined the KPIs you need to report on, you need to set performance goals for each KPI that you can track across each phase of your ServiceNow project plan. It’s also
important that you consider how often you need to collect data to update KPI measurements in order to inform the groups that use KPIs to guide their day-to-day work and decision-
making. 

Set baseline metrics and goal metrics for all defined KPIs
 Gather historic data (when possible) showing relevant past performance
measurements to compare with your new KPI measurements. For example, your
current state may be 10 touch points to manage incidents.
 Set goal values for each newly defined KPI with a set time frame for when you want
to achieve those goals. For example, the goal may be “40% reduction in touch points
to manage incidents within18 months.”
 Document these goals so you can refer to them when presenting on KPI performance
in the future. Make sure all teams are aligned with the same definition for the KPIs
and goals.
Set intermediate KPI target goals for each phase of your program plan
 Review your ServiceNow phased project plan.
Define what your KPIs enable and how often measurements are needed
 Identify the specific actions or decisions that each KPI informs (such as budget
adjustments, work prioritization, investment decisions, etc.).
 Consider how often each KPI will be used to inform those actions or decisions (e.g.,
the KPI # of tickets in backlog informs an administrator's day-to-day work and
should be provided frequently, whereas KPIs measuring platform adoption rates
might only need to inform actions or decisions during monthly leadership meetings).
 Schedule when KPI performance will be measured and recorded based on how
frequently the KPI is used to inform actions or decisions.
 Display KPI results on a dashboard, either using ServiceNow Performance Analytics
dashboarding capabilities or your own format.

 Define target KPI performance goals for the end of each phase in your project plan. Practitioner insight: Consider how different groups—process users, the executive steering
For example, set goals for ServiceNow adoption at 1,000 unique ServiceNow users board, governance bodies, service owners, etc.—can use KPI performance to guide where they
by end of phase 1 (6 months) then for 2,500 unique ServiceNow users by end of phase need to focus their work. Use this insight to provide only relevant KPI results to each separate
2 (12 months) and so on. group and to potentially guide custom dashboard design for each group. 
 Focus first on setting goals for phase 1 for all defined KPIs.
 Record when KPI performance goals are met or missed over time. 1. Understand 3. Define 4. Continually 5. Extend
2. Define
Steps your business diagnostic improve metrics metrics
KPIs
objectives metrics tracking usage
7 © 2020 ServiceNow, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
Step 3: Define diagnostic metrics
KPIs are important to report on progress and prompt decisions at the leadership level. However, they don’t necessarily provide the ServiceNow implementation and management
team enough detailed information to know that they’re completing the right or wrong activities in time to course correct. To fill this gap, you need to define the diagnostic metrics
(also known as leading indicators that report on the performance of various processes or activities that, together, contribute to achieving KPI goals) that you and your team track to
predict and understand more granularly what’s happening with KPI performance. These metrics help you diagnose KPI performance trends so you know how to reprioritize work
and adjust project plans in real time to resolve roadblocks that could jeopardize your ability to achieve business outcomes. 

Define diagnostic metrics that help you and your team understand KPI results and that inform how you can influence them

 Review the KPIs defined in Step 2.

 Understand the underlying workflows and processes to achieve the KPI. Determine what you will need to track to influence the performance of each KPI directly in a daily or
weekly time frame. Make sure you can influence the metrics in the short term and can use them to predict how the KPI will perform longer term. Do this for all KPIs defined.
 For example, # of unique users migrated to the platform is difficult to influence short term, so tracking something more manageable like % of process owners trained on ServiceNow
provides you with a metric you know how to influence—by training process owners. And it can be used to predict if you’ll meet your user adoption KPI goals,  because it’s more likely that
users will migrate to the platform if process owners are trained on using it.

 Determine if each KPI provides enough information for you to know how to course correct if performance is poor. If not, consider what other related metrics you can measure that
will help inform project plan adjustments to steer KPI results positively.
 For example, % reduction in the time it takes to resolve incidents measures changes in how long it takes the incident management process to flow from end to end, but what do you do if this
time isn’t going down? Defining diagnostic metrics like reduction in number of touch points to manage incidents or average amount of time spent at each touch point provides easily
measurable indicators that can inform what’s preventing expected KPI performance .

 Build a dashboard for teams to track the metrics, diagnose performance trends, and predict if their work is on or off course. Make sure that your ServiceNow platform team is
aware of the dashboard and the metrics tracked.

1. Understand 3. Define 4. Continually 5. Extend

1. Understand your business 2. Define
Steps 2. Define KPIs 3. Define
Steps diagnostic
business
metrics 4. Continually improve
diagnostic
metrics tracking improve5. metrics
Extend metrics metrics
usage
objectives KPIs
objectives metrics tracking usage
8 © 2020 ServiceNow, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
Step 3: Define diagnostic metrics (Continued)
Use diagnostic metrics to inform course corrections in project plans
Practitioner insight: You likely won’t need to define
 Review KPI performance at least monthly. diagnostic metrics for each of your defined KPIs. For
example, many implementation KPIs might speak for
 Involve your team in investigating where KPI performance is trending to miss target goals (set
themselves. But you’ll need diagnostic metrics that help
in Step 2c), using diagnostic metrics as indicators.
you figure out what’s happening with some of your
 Document why you think KPI performance was abnormal, citing diagnostic metrics that KPIs (especially for outcome KPIs) if you want to
support your analysis. understand the root cause of KPI performance and
actually influence them.
 Revise project plans (deadlines, project sequencing, planned deployments/updates, etc.) based
on your findings.

Practitioner insight: Implementation KPIs can also

provide useful insight as diagnostic metrics to diagnose
the cause for trends in outcome KPI performance. For
example, if operations teams are not adopting incident
management on ServiceNow at the rate you expected,
it’s unlikely that you’ll realize expected cost decreases
associated with the implementation of that capability).

1. Understand 3. Define 4. Continually 5. Extend

1. Understand your business 2. Define
Steps 2. Define KPIs 3. Define
Steps diagnostic
business
metrics 4. Continually improve
diagnostic
metrics tracking improve5. metrics
Extend metrics metrics
usage
objectives KPIs
objectives metrics tracking usage
9 © 2020 ServiceNow, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
Step 4: Continually improve metrics tracking
Once you’ve defined a useful set of KPIs and diagnostic metrics, it’s time to consider how you’ll make sure that your efforts to measure performance continue to deliver what
they’re intended to deliver over time. Treating performance measurement and tracking as a one-time project is a mistake. Instead, continue to invest to make sure you define your
metrics as well as is possible, update them when necessary, and share them with the right people. 

Define accountability for ongoing metrics management

 The Now Platform owner should partner with their executive sponsor to assign one or more metrics managers with the responsibility and accountability for ongoing metrics
management, including:
 Finding and maintaining the data sources needed to report on defined KPIs, which is critical because ServiceNow may be connecting to and consolidating multiple data sources across
many systems to generate reports
 Revisiting your ServiceNow vision, business case, and project plan documents every six months to see if any changes have been made that would require KPI redefinition
 Periodic review—at least monthly and always after new business and/or ServiceNow visions and objectives are set—of what KPIs need to be tracked, removing existing KPIs that are no
longer relevant, and identifying when new metrics are needed 
 Redefining KPIs in collaboration with process or service owners as needed
 Sharing KPI dashboards with roles and groups that need them to inform decisions
 Assessing whether diagnostic metrics are helping the ServiceNow team diagnose issues and make course corrections, and suggesting redefinition or new metrics as needed

 Map new KPI management responsibilities and authorities with the responsibilities and authorities of other existing roles. (If you maintain an organizational RACI chart that
documents role responsibilities and accountabilities, add “KPI manager(s)” to the chart.)
 Identify where KPI management responsibilities and accountabilities may overlap with existing roles and verify that these overlaps will not cause confusion.

1. Understand 3. Define 4. Continually 5. Extend

1. Understand your business 2.4.Define
Continually improve metrics
Steps 2. Define KPIs 3. Steps
Define diagnostic
business
metrics diagnostic improve5. metrics
Extend metrics metrics
usage
objectives KPIs tracking
objectives metrics tracking usage
10 © 2020 ServiceNow, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
Step 4: Continually improve metrics tracking (Continued)
Have the role(s) assigned accountability for metrics tracking conduct a Benchmark against peers (including companies in the same industry, of similar size in
quarterly review of the existing metrics and how they’re measured and terms of revenue, number of employees, and competitors) every six to 12 months to
tracked source new ideas for how to measure and track performance, considering: 

 During metrics reviews, have the metrics manager(s) ask:   Are they using similar KPIs if their objectives are consistent?
 Are the KPIs defined still a useful set of performance indicators?
 How are they performing? Are we ahead or behind?
 Are your KPI data sources consistent and secure? Has data quality
improved or deteriorated?   Are there opportunities to learn from what peers are doing? For example, are they
 Are you still tracking the most up-to-date KPIs? Have any objectives been measuring cleverly defined KPIs that we aren’t using?
fulfilled, meaning relevant KPIs no longer need to be tracked? Have there
been any changes in your strategic vision or ServiceNow roadmap that  Where can we increase our KPI performance goals to leapfrog our peers?
might impact what you need to measure? Have there been any product
changes from ServiceNow that impact what you need to measure?
 Are your stakeholder groups still getting the information they need from
dashboards? Are the KPIs actually informing the decisions they need to
make? Would they suggest any improvements, redefinitions, or new Practitioner insight: Many organizations hire consulting or advisory companies to help them
KPIs?  benchmark against other companies. While these services can provide extensive comparisons, they
 Are your diagnostic metrics helping you predict KPI performance, can be costly and time-consuming engagements. Alternatively, you can try partnering with peers at
diagnose issues, and influence positive results? other companies to talk shop and compare results (although you should be careful about partnering
this way with peers working at direct competitor companies). ServiceNow Community forums,
user groups, and events are all opportunities to meet others who might be interested in this kind of
informal benchmarking. If that’s not enough, ServiceNow Benchmarks and Data Insights can help
you compare your service management performance to the industry averages of your peers.

1. Understand 3. Define 4. Continually 5. Extend

1. Understand your business 2.4.Define
Continually improve metrics
Steps 2. Define KPIs 3. Steps
Define diagnostic
business
metrics diagnostic improve5. metrics
Extend metrics metrics
usage
objectives KPIs tracking
objectives metrics tracking usage
11 © 2020 ServiceNow, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
Step 5: Extend metrics usage
Unless you invest in enabling others to view and use your measurements, metrics only offer evidence of how ServiceNow is supporting business outcomes to you, your team, and
the senior leaders you report to. To fully realize the value of tracking ServiceNow metrics, you need all groups using ServiceNow in your organization to use metrics to tell them
how they do work and make decisions. Excellent results are most likely when employees understand how to inform their work using past performance measurement.

Provide groups that can benefit from informing their work with ServiceNow KPI performance—process owners, operations
teams, leadership, governance committees, etc.—with KPI measurements that are relevant to their work Practitioner insight: ServiceNow
Performance Analytics offers a number of
 List the different stakeholder groups that you think could benefit from using KPI performance to inform their work. These pre-built, OOTB dashboards already
groups might include business leaders from each of the business areas you support with ServiceNow, governance boards, process designed to inform different stakeholder
owners, IT operations teams, partners, and vendors. groups that you can quickly turn on and
share using the platform.
 Work with someone from each of the groups on your list to discuss the types of information that would be most helpful to them,
then help them select two to five KPIs (from those defined in Step 2) that will most closely provide the information they need.
 If no predefined KPIs will provide the information they need, consider where you can define new KPIs.

 Based on your conversation with someone from each group, build a custom dashboard for each group that presents up-to-date
results for the KPIs you helped them select and explore how ServiceNow Performance Analytics can support this. 

 Meet with someone from each metrics user group every six months to make sure that the KPIs on their dashboard are still
relevant to the work they do.
 During these meetings, collect examples of how their group used metrics to inform their work and decisions, looking for success stories
that can be shared with leaders and members from other groups.

1. Understand 3. Define 4. Continually 5. Extend

1. Understand your business 2. Define
Steps 2. Define KPIs 3. Steps
Define diagnostic
business
metrics 4. Continually improve
diagnostic
metrics tracking improve5. Extend
metrics metrics metrics
usage
objectives KPIs
objectives metrics tracking usage
12 © 2020 ServiceNow, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
 KPIs and stakeholders

Key performance indicators Essential KPIs Nice-to-have KPIs

• # of defined KPIs • % KPIs that have been redefined in current year
• % of KPIs with associated diagnostic metrics • % change of total defined KPIs in current year
• # of project plan adjustments (associated with metrics
performance)
• # of groups using KPI measurements to inform work

Stakeholder map Responsible/accountable Consulted/informed

• Now Platform owner • Enterprise architecture
• ServiceNow executive sponsor • Business engagement teams
• Service owners • IT staff (especially the help desk)
• Process owners • Vendors and partners
• CIO/senior IT leadership • Business leaders (in areas where ServiceNow is
implemented)

13 © 2020 ServiceNow, Inc. All Rights Reserved.

Appendix

14 © 2020 ServiceNow, Inc. All Rights Reserved.

 Appendix: Example outcome KPIs by business outcome
Business Modernize IT Take control of Eliminate service Resolve real-time Consumerize the Resolve customer Optimize
outcome service management applications, outages security threats fast employee service issues fast performance with
projects, and experience real-time analytics
financials
Outcome • Reduction in • Reduction/ • Reduction in • Decrease in time to • Decrease in case • Increase in cases • Reduction in
KPIs incidents caused rationalization of incidents prioritize and resolve resolution times deflected through number of
by changes applications under related to incidents • Improvements in knowledge reporting tools
• Reduction in management changes • Reduction in backlog employee • Reduced time spent • Improvements in
number of touch • Reduction in the • Reduction in of security incidents satisfaction resolving cases data accuracy
points to manage demand cycle change and vulnerabilities • Decreased cycle • Improved first call • Improvements in
incidents or time planning time • Reduction of time in request resolution employee
requests • Reduced cycle • Decrease in business risk through process • Reduced average productivity
• Improved time for budget/ incidents visibility into critical • Increased case handling time • Improvements in
request delivery project portfolio • Decrease in services adoption of self- • Improved customer operational
planning outage MTTR • Reduced time spent service and agent efficiency for
• Reduced project • Decrease in on enrichment tasks satisfaction services
cycle time major outages through automation • Improved NPS
and threat • Improved customer
intelligence retention
• Reduction in
customer effort

15 © 2020 ServiceNow, Inc. All Rights Reserved.

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