Historically, IT Service Management (ITSM) has often claimed to be “customer-focused,” but in practice, it wasn’t quite there. These days, however, there’s a clear and encouraging shift toward measuring value and customer experiences more holistically. As organizations move in this direction, Service Level Agreements (SLAs), long considered the gold standard for IT service delivery, are being re-evaluated. While SLAs remain critical for operational benchmarks—like response times and issue resolution times—they fall short when it comes to capturing the full customer experience.
This is where Experience Level Agreements (XLAs) step in. While SLAs focus purely on operational metrics, XLAs emphasize the qualitative and emotional aspects of service delivery. Together, SLAs and XLAs create a balanced approach to improving team productivity and enhancing customer satisfaction.
Today we’ll take a Grand Tour of the limitations of SLAs, and have a few thoughts about how the customer experience can be better understood and improved through XLAs
Understanding SLAs: What They Measure and Their Limitations
SLAs, or Service Level Agreements, define the minimum performance metrics expected from a service. They establish accountability by setting operational benchmarks, such as first response times, resolution times, or the duration spent in specific issue statuses. While SLAs are critical for maintaining transparency and consistency in IT workflows, they often result in a “check-box” approach to service quality. This focus on operational performance can sometimes overshadow the customer’s actual experience with the service.
A phenomenon commonly referred to as the “watermelon effect” illustrates this problem well. On the surface, SLA metrics might appear “green,” signaling that targets have been met. However, beneath this glossy exterior lies “red”—hidden customer dissatisfaction that isn’t captured by these operational measures. For example, an IT department might excel at meeting SLA timelines, but the customers interacting with them might still feel frustrated due to poor communication, lack of personalization, or overly rigid processes.
Consider a real-life scenario: Your IT team resolves all tickets within SLA targets, but the results of your annual employee satisfaction survey reveal IT as the organization’s lowest-rated department. The metrics say everything is fine, but the lived experience of customers tells a different story. This disconnect is the watermelon effect in action, and it happens more often than you might think.
SLAs are inherently transactional and focus on specific, measurable outcomes. Tools like CSAT (Customer Satisfaction Score) or NPS (Net Promoter Score) are often paired with SLAs to supplement these metrics with customer feedback. While valuable, these surveys only capture isolated moments in time and fail to address broader, systemic issues or cumulative customer experiences. A CSAT might indicate how a single ticket was handled, but it cannot reflect the overall experience of interacting with IT services over weeks, months, or years.
Once upon a time, ITSM tools lacked the sophistication needed to bring personalization to SLAs. Today, this is no longer the case. However, challenges remain: outdated benchmarks, insufficient understanding of customer needs, or even misconfigurations in tools like Jira can make SLA implementations feel overly simplistic or rigid. How long has it been since your organization revisited its SLAs? Do they still align with your current business goals and customer expectations?
To be clear, SLAs are not inherently bad. They remain essential for setting operational standards and should not be discarded. However, relying solely on SLAs, even when paired with transactional metrics like CSAT, is insufficient for capturing the nuanced, human-centric aspects of customer experience.
Experience is cumulative. A customer’s perception of your service isn’t shaped by one or two isolated tickets. Rather, it’s the sum of every interaction they’ve had, from minor queries to major incidents. Averaging CSAT scores or relying solely on SLA compliance misses the bigger picture. What are customers truly responding to in those surveys? Are the metrics capturing the frustration of a poorly designed process or celebrating an exceptional moment of service?
As experts in the field have pointed out, an experience reflects the totality of interactions—not just the moments documented by SLA compliance or transactional surveys. This broader perspective is crucial for bridging the gap between operational efficiency and customer satisfaction.
Why XLAs Matter for Customer Satisfaction
XLAs measure sentiment, while SLAs focus on operational performance. Both are essential for understanding and improving customer satisfaction, and they work best when used together. Rather than viewing them as competing approaches, think of SLAs and XLAs as complementary building blocks. Each serves a unique purpose in painting a complete picture of your service delivery.
XLAs go beyond the transactional metrics of SLAs by capturing the qualitative, human-centric aspects of service. For example, they measure satisfaction trends, cumulative experiences, and customer sentiment—providing a richer and more nuanced understanding of service quality. This allows organizations to identify areas where customers feel truly understood and supported, addressing gaps that SLAs alone cannot.
ITIL encourages us to “Start where you are.” Begin by gathering the metrics and tools already available, whether they are operational benchmarks, technical performance data, or early sentiment indicators. Incorporate metrics that reflect how customers feel about their interactions with IT (yes, FEELINGS matter). XLAs, alongside SLAs, allow teams to align with customer expectations and deliver services that resonate on a deeper level.
Collecting data isn’t just about ticking boxes or hitting targets; it’s about achieving your goals and supporting the ambitions of your customers. With the right combination of metrics from SLAs, XLAs, and even infrastructure tools or digital experience platforms, teams can gain actionable insights into both operational performance and customer sentiment. It’s a gradual process that takes time, but starting small and building up will yield significant results over time.
By incorporating XLAs into your workflows, you not only complement SLAs but also empower your team to deliver services that are aligned with what customers truly value. Tools like Elements Pulse make this transition easier by enabling real-time sentiment analysis and dynamic dashboards in Jira Service Management. These tools help you connect the dots between operational efficiency and customer experience, ensuring your IT services deliver both measurable performance and genuine satisfaction.
Implementing XLAs in Jira Service Management
If you’re using Jira Service Management (JSM), you already have the tools to capture sentiment, thanks to Jira’s built-in AI features. But to fully embrace XLAs and enhance your service delivery, Elements Pulse takes your capabilities to the next level. Here’s how it can transform your approach:
With Elements Pulse, dynamic dashboards become your go-to for combining SLA metrics with real-time sentiment indicators. This integration offers a comprehensive view of service performance, helping teams connect operational metrics to the actual customer experience. Imagine tracking not only how fast your team resolves tickets but also how customers feel during those interactions.
Customizable metrics allow you to tailor your service goals to align with what matters most to your organization. Whether it’s measuring the emotional tone of customer feedback or pinpointing bottlenecks in workflows, Elements Pulse gives you the flexibility to focus on what drives satisfaction and loyalty.
Enhanced visibility is another key benefit. By bridging the gap between SLAs and XLAs, Elements Pulse delivers actionable insights that let you tackle customer pain points effectively. For example, consider a situation where customers frequently complain about repetitive back-and-forth communications with support agents. While SLAs might indicate that response times are within targets, XLAs capture frustration in the customer’s sentiment. With Elements Pulse, these underlying issues are brought to light, enabling your team to improve both operational efficiency and the customer experience.
Elements Pulse helps you recognize the stories hidden in your data. Have you ever heard a customer say, “I had to explain my problem five times, and it was exhausting”? While SLAs might show green, XLAs reveal the red flag behind the interaction. With Elements Pulse, JSM doesn’t just help you meet targets—it helps you address the sentiments driving customer satisfaction and dissatisfaction, unifying SLAs and XLAs into a single, actionable framework.
Shifting Toward XLAs for Better Customer Satisfaction Metrics
The transition from SLAs to XLAs represents a fundamental shift in how organizations approach IT service management. Rather than focusing solely on compliance, XLAs encourage teams to adopt a customer-centric mindset, aligning their efforts with the broader goals of customer satisfaction and business success.
For IT teams using Atlassian Jira Service Management, tools like Elements Pulse provide the necessary capabilities to implement XLAs seamlessly. By integrating sentiment analysis, real-time metrics, and dynamic dashboards, Elements Pulse enhances Jira’s native capabilities, enabling teams to deliver a superior customer experience.
4 Key Takeaways for Adopting XLAS in Jira Service Management
- SLAs and XLAs are complementary: SLAs set the foundation for operational performance, while XLAs address the qualitative aspects of customer satisfaction. Together, they create a comprehensive framework for measuring success.
- Start small and scale gradually: Begin by incorporating sentiment analysis into your workflows using tools like Elements Pulse. Over time, expand your metrics to include more complex XLAs.
- Leverage existing tools: If you’re already using Jira, take advantage of its native AI features and enhance them with Elements Pulse for greater insight and functionality.
- Focus on the customer journey: Remember that customer satisfaction is cumulative. XLAs help you understand the entire journey, not just individual touchpoints.
By integrating XLAs into your IT service management strategy, you can move beyond operational benchmarks and truly understand what drives customer satisfaction. With tools like Elements Pulse, Jira Service Management users can transform their workflows and deliver a superior customer experience.