Scenario analysis
Summarize
Summary of Scenario analysis
Scenario analysis in ServiceNow Operational Resilience allows customers to evaluate how critical business services perform under adverse conditions by simulating event scenarios and assessing their impact on services and dependencies. This analysis supports informed treatment decisions and operational vulnerability logging.
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Starting with the Australia release (version 22.3.1), advanced scenario analysis incorporates simulation, statistical modeling, and a guided Playbook experience within the Operational Resilience Workspace, enhancing risk assessment accuracy and usability compared to the legacy process.
Key Features
- Structured Playbook Guidance: Provides a data-driven, step-by-step workflow that guides analysts from defining scope through to treatment decisions, overcoming the complexity and fragmentation of the legacy flow.
- Monte Carlo Statistical Modeling: Simulates annual loss projections to quantify financial risk exposure, offering more reliable and precise risk evaluations than manual methods.
- Data-Driven Financial Impact Analysis: Utilizes an Annual Loss Model combined with historical risk-event data to calculate the probability of breaching a service’s loss tolerance, enabling quantifiable financial impact assessments.
- Statistical Model Profile: Connects the simulation engine to analyst assessments by translating mathematical parameters into plain-language questions, facilitating advanced scenario analysis. This method requires the IRM Advanced license and Smart Assessment Engine templates configured for advanced or manual scenario analysis.
- Scenario Analysis Lifecycle: Records start in a Draft state and transition to Completed when analysis is finalized, after which they become read-only.
Known Limitations
- The owner and assessor roles must be assigned to the same individual.
- Each scenario analysis record can scope only a single critical business service.
- The Monte Carlo model is fixed in configuration; distribution types cannot be changed, nor can custom models be introduced.
- Only risk events are supported as reference data inputs for the simulation.
Additional Information
The advanced scenario analysis is enabled by default starting in version 22.3.1. Customers needing the legacy experience can switch back to it via configuration settings. Before using the advanced method, verify that Smart Assessment templates are properly created and published in the Assessment Workspace.
Conduct a scenario analysis to assess how a critical service performs under adverse conditions. Starting with Operational Resilience, version 22.3.1, you can use the advanced scenario analysis with simulation in the Operational Resilience Workspace, apply statistical modelling to quantify financial impact, and record a treatment decision.
What is a scenario analysis
A scenario analysis evaluates the impact of adverse-event scenarios on the services that support your business. You run scenarios against a service and its dependencies. You can then use the results to make a treatment decision and log operational vulnerabilities or issues.
Releases before Operational Resilience, version 22.3.1 supported the legacy scenario analysis flow, which had the following limitations:
- Complex navigation — Steps opened simultaneously as tabs with no guided sequence, making it difficult for analysts to track progress or determine next steps.
- Limited output — The result was a "Breached/Not breached" outcome with minimal contextual data, providing little actionable insight.
- Manual, repetitive effort — Analysts manually answered each question for every scenario event, with no data-driven assistance to populate or guide responses.
Benefits of using simulation and the guided experience
- Structured Playbook guidance: Replaces the fragmented, manually driven legacy process with a structured, data-driven Playbook that guides analysts from scope definition to treatment decision.
- Monte Carlo statistical modelling: Quantifies financial risk exposure through simulated annual loss projections, providing more accurate and reliable risk assessments than manual methods.
- Data-driven financial impact analysis: Uses an Annual Loss Model and historical risk-event reference data to produce a quantified financial impact and calculate the probability of breaching a service's loss tolerance.
Statistical model profile
When you create a scenario analysis record, select Statistical Modelling — used for advanced scenario analysis — or Manual in the Method field. The Statistical model profile bridges the simulation engine and the analyst experience by mapping mathematical parameters to plain-language assessment questions.
The base configuration includes an annual loss model driven by risk events, which references input and output templates managed through the Smart Assessment Engine (SAE).
Before selecting a method, verify with your administrator that Smart Assessment templates have been created and published in the Assessment Workspace, using the purpose Scenario Analysis (advanced) or Scenario Analysis - Manual. For more information, see the following topics:
States for the analysis
A scenario analysis record moves through different states. A newly created record starts in the Draft state. When you select Complete analysis and confirm the prompt, the record moves to Completed and becomes read-only.
Known limitations
- Owner and assessor roles — The owner and assessor must be the same person.
- Single service per analysis — Only one critical business service can be scoped per scenario analysis record.
- Model capabilities — The Monte Carlo model is tightly coupled to the configuration. You cannot swap distribution types (for example, triangular or normal) or introduce custom models.
- Reference data — Only risk events are supported as reference data inputs.
Legacy scenario analysis
The advanced scenario analysis is enabled by default. For an overview of the legacy experience, see Legacy scenario analysis. To switch to the legacy flow, see Enable the legacy scenario analysis flow.