Indicator form

  • Release version: Xanadu
  • Updated August 1, 2024
  • 4 minutes to read
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    Summary of Indicator form

    The Indicator form in ServiceNow's Enterprise Architecture application enables customers to define and manage business metrics that evaluate applications across key dimensions such as cost, quality, technical risk, investments, user satisfaction, and business value. These indicators help customers monitor application performance, support decision-making, and improve governance by providing normalized, quantifiable scores displayed in scorecards and dashboards.

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    Key Features

    • Indicator Configuration Fields: Customers can specify the indicator’s name, category, description, and whether the metric should be maximized or minimized based on business goals.
    • Result Control: Fields like result limit and result precision allow control over performance and display accuracy of indicator values.
    • Unit and Refresh: Units can be numeric, currency, time-based, or custom, and indicators support automatic refresh intervals for up-to-date scoring.
    • Ordering and Frequency: Indicators can be ordered for display purposes, and frequency settings ensure data collection aligns with fiscal periods and normalization logic.
    • Target Values and Normalization: Target minimum and maximum values support goal setting and normalization, with options to consider absolute values or use intelligent dynamic normalization.
    • Data Source Options: Indicators can source data from Performance Analytics, custom scripts, query conditions, assessments, or child indicators, enabling flexible integration with various data types and applications.
    • Normalization Scripts and Consolidation: Scripts allow standardized scoring across applications, and consolidation methods (sum, average, max, min) aggregate values appropriately over time periods.
    • Click Through Capabilities: Users can configure navigation options and custom scripts for indicator data drill-down, allowing quick access to related dashboards or application details in preferred window formats.

    Practical Use for ServiceNow Customers

    By configuring application indicators, customers can systematically track and evaluate application health and performance metrics aligned with strategic objectives. The form’s flexible data sourcing and normalization enable accurate, timely insights into application portfolios. Integration with Performance Analytics and assessment frameworks ensures comprehensive measurement and reporting. Click through features enhance user experience by facilitating direct access to underlying data or related workflows, streamlining analysis and decision-making.

    Overall, the Indicator form empowers customers to create tailored, actionable metrics that drive informed management of their enterprise applications and capabilities.

    Application indicators are business metrics that assess the applications across dimensions such as cost, quality, technical risk, investments, user satisfaction, and business value.

    Indicator form fields

    Field Description
    Name Name of the application indicator.
    Category Category that the indicator is associated with.
    Short description Short summary of the application indicator.
    Direction Business application with maximum or minimum values. Select Minimize if lower values are better. Select Maximize if higher values are better.
    Result limit The maximum number of records an indicator displays when running an associated script. This enables better performance of the Enterprise Architecture by not processing too many records.
    Result Precision Define how many decimal places are displayed for the indicator's calculated value in the scorecards and dashboards. For example, a result precision value of 0 means that the value is rounded to the nearest whole number.
    Unit

    A number, currency, time, duration in minutes, hours, days, month, or quarter, or rate.

    You can also create units according to your requirements.
    Automatic refresh interval The refresh interval to update the indicator scores within the defined time range.
    Order The position of the indicator in the sequential order of all other indicators while accessing an application or capability.
    Frequency Frequency determines the interval at which the data for the indicator source should be collected.

    The Frequency field isn’t available when Performance Analytics is selected from the Data source list.

    The indicator frequency must match the fiscal period being scored for the Target maximum and Target minimum values to be applied during normalization. If the frequencies don’t match, the system uses dynamic normalization instead.
    Target maximum Maximum value for the indicator.

    The Target maximum field isn’t available when Assessments is selected from the Data source list.
    Active Select the Active option to enable the indicator.
    CI Class CI type for which the score is generated.
    Target minimum Minimum value for the indicator.

    The Target minimum field isn’t available when Assessments is selected from the Data source list.
    Consider Absolute Values Option to consider values from the Target maximum and Target minimum fields.

    This field is available only when values are entered in the Target maximum and Target minimum fields.

    When the check box is cleared, values for target maximum and target minimum are considered based on the intelligent logic.

    The target maximum and target minimum values are applied only when the indicator frequency matches the fiscal period being scored. If the frequencies don’t match, the system uses dynamic normalization regardless of whether this check box is selected.
    Table 1. Datasource Configuration section form fields
    Field Description
    Data source

    Defines the location from which the indicator receives data.

    • Performance Analytics: Collects scores from indicators created in Performance Analytics. See Performance Analytics indicators.
    • Custom Script: Enables you to write a script that collects data from another application. Beneath the Data Source field, a sample script appears. Customize the script as needed.
    • Query Condition: Enables you to select a table to run filters on to obtain data.
    • Assessments: Enables you to evaluate, score, and rank records by assessing records in a table. See Create metric types and generate assessable records. To view results of survey assessments within Enterprise Architecture, see Generate survey assessments and view results within APM.
    • Indicators: Enables you to add dependent child indicators. Through the child indicators, data is gathered to the parent indicator.

      For example, if the parent indicator is number of issues, the dependent indicators can be number of incident counts, number of problems, and changes. These dependent indicators are child indicators and the number of incidents, problems, and changes recorded are consolidated up to the parent indicator as the number of issues.
    Indicator The Indicator field appears when Performance Analytics is selected from the Data source list.

    Indicators are statistics that are used to measure current conditions and forecast trends.

    Note:
    If the collection frequency of the application indicator is not greater than the frequency at which the data of the Performance Analytic indicator are generated, then the system displays an error message: Frequency of the indicator must always be greater than or equal to the frequency of the datasource configuration indicator. For more information, see Collection of PA indicator score data.
    Default breakdown Name of the Performance Analytics breakdown.
    Normalization script A script to evaluate and score business applications and capabilities using standardized metrics. It involves using indicators that provide a normalized score for the condition they are evaluating. These indicators can be based on assessments, query conditions, custom scripts, or performance analytics.
    Consolidation Computational method for aggregating the values, a function such as sum, average, maximum, or minimum.

    Default is Average. For example, Average is the sum of the monthly values divided by the total number of months in a quarter.

    If you select Maximum or Minimum, then it’s the maximum value or the minimum value of a month in the quarter, respectively.

    If you select Sum, then it’s an aggregate of all monthly values in the quarter.
    Assessment Metric Type Type of metric that is used to assess the indicator.

    Assessment Metric Type field appears when the Data source is Assessments.
    Assessment Metric Category Category of the metric.
    Table 2. Click Through section form fields
    Field Description
    Click through URL navigation type Select whether to view the application or capability indicator details in a new window, in the same window, or in a dialog box.
    Click through URL script The script associated with an indicator that allows users to select a URL and view the indicator data in a related application or dashboard. This enables quick access to relevant information, or actions related to the indicator data.