SLA & SLO Engineer
When to Use
- Select SLIs and document measurement queries, exclusions, and data sources
- Set SLO targets, rolling windows, and per-journey or per-tier policies
- Define error-budget math, consumption tracking, and policy actions (freeze, focus)
- Design multi-window burn-rate alert policies and severity routing
- Align customer-facing SLAs with internal SLOs (credits, measurements, carve-outs)
- Tier services by criticality and map tiers to targets and review cadence
- Run SLO review meetings, executive summaries, and quarterly governance
- Estimate capacity headroom implied by latency or availability targets
- Publish SLO specs for engineering (YAML/JSON schema, dashboard contracts)
When NOT to Use
- Lead outage mitigation, paging, or on-call rotations →
site-reliability-engineer, incident-management-engineer
- Negotiate contract language, credits, or legal remedies →
commercial-counsel
- Build metrics/log/trace pipelines, collectors, or alertmanager config →
devops, platform-engineer
- Profile application code, load-test, or tune queries only →
performance-engineer
- Run production readiness reviews, chaos games, or release cutover →
site-reliability-engineer, deployment-strategist
- Coordinate multi-team program milestones without SLO scope →
technical-program-manager
Related skills
| Need |
Skill |
| SRE execution: PRR, incident mitigation, chaos, release gates |
site-reliability-engineer |
| Incident program, SEV, on-call, postmortems |
incident-management-engineer |
| CI/CD pipelines, DORA, deploy gates wired to SLO policy |
ci-cd-engineer |
| Delivery infra, GitOps, alert stack implementation |
devops |
| IDP golden paths, platform SLOs for portal/scaffold |
platform-engineer |
| Load testing and latency profiling |
performance-engineer |
| Rollout strategy and change tiers |
deployment-strategist |
| Cross-team launch and RAID |
technical-program-manager |
| Contractual SLA terms and redlines |
commercial-counsel |
| Data pipeline freshness or warehouse SLAs |
data-system-ops-lead |
Core Workflows
1. Scope and principles
Service-level taxonomy, user-centric measurement, boundaries with SRE and legal.
See references/sla_slo_scope_and_principles.md.
2. SLI selection and measurement
Choose SLIs, define queries, exclusions, and validation.
See references/sli_selection_and_measurement.md.
3. SLO targeting and error budgets
Targets, windows, budget math, and policy actions.
See references/slo_targeting_and_error_budgets.md.
4. Alerting, burn rates, and policies
Multi-window alerts, routing, and noise control.
See references/alerting_burn_rates_and_policies.md.
5. Customer SLA vs internal SLO
Contract alignment, credits, carve-outs, and communication.
See references/customer_sla_vs_internal_slo.md.
6. Reporting, review, and governance
Cadences, dashboards, specs, and executive reporting.
See references/reporting_review_and_governance.md.
Outputs
- SLO specification — SLI definition, query, target, window, exclusions, owners, tier
- Error-budget policy — thresholds, actions, escalation, link to release policy
- Burn-rate alert policy — windows, multipliers, severity, runbook links
- SLA/SLO alignment matrix — customer metric ↔ internal SLI, measurement gaps, carve-outs
- Tier catalog — criticality definitions with default targets and review cadence
- SLO review pack — budget consumed, trends, top burners, proposed target changes
- Capacity note — headroom vs latency/availability target (when in scope)
Principles
- Measure user outcomes — availability and latency of journeys, not vanity infra metrics
- Internal SLO stricter than external SLA — buffer for measurement lag and goodwill
- Policy before panic — error-budget actions agreed before budget exhaustion
- Alerts prove SLO risk — every page ties to budget burn or imminent breach
- Govern with data — reviews change targets from evidence, not anecdotes
- Hand off execution — SRE and IM own incident response; this skill owns the level definitions
When to load references
- Scope and taxonomy →
references/sla_slo_scope_and_principles.md
- SLI design →
references/sli_selection_and_measurement.md
- Targets and budgets →
references/slo_targeting_and_error_budgets.md
- Burn alerts →
references/alerting_burn_rates_and_policies.md
- Customer SLA →
references/customer_sla_vs_internal_slo.md
- Reviews and governance →
references/reporting_review_and_governance.md
1---2name: sla-slo-engineer3description: Guides SLA and SLO engineering—SLI selection and measurement specs, SLO targets and error budgets, multi-window burn-rate alerting policies, customer-facing SLA vs internal SLO alignment, criticality tiering, reporting and review cadences, and capacity implications of service levels. Use when defining SLIs, setting SLO targets, designing error-budget policy, burn-rate alerts, availability or latency SLOs, SLO reviews, or documenting SLO specs for engineering—not on-call or incident command (site-reliability-engineer, incident-management-engineer), contractual legal SLA negotiation (commercial-counsel), full observability stack implementation (platform-engineer, devops), or application performance tuning only (performance-engineer). Triggers: SLA, SLO, SLI, service level objective, error budget, burn rate alert, availability target, latency SLO, define SLOs, SLO review, customer SLA.4---56# SLA & SLO Engineer78## When to Use910- Select **SLIs** and document measurement queries, exclusions, and data sources11- Set **SLO targets**, rolling windows, and per-journey or per-tier policies12- Define **error-budget** math, consumption tracking, and policy actions (freeze, focus)13- Design **multi-window burn-rate** alert policies and severity routing14- Align **customer-facing SLAs** with internal SLOs (credits, measurements, carve-outs)15- Tier services by **criticality** and map tiers to targets and review cadence16- Run **SLO review** meetings, executive summaries, and quarterly governance17- Estimate **capacity headroom** implied by latency or availability targets18- Publish **SLO specs** for engineering (YAML/JSON schema, dashboard contracts)1920## When NOT to Use2122- Lead outage mitigation, paging, or on-call rotations → `site-reliability-engineer`, `incident-management-engineer`23- Negotiate contract language, credits, or legal remedies → `commercial-counsel`24- Build metrics/log/trace pipelines, collectors, or alertmanager config → `devops`, `platform-engineer`25- Profile application code, load-test, or tune queries only → `performance-engineer`26- Run production readiness reviews, chaos games, or release cutover → `site-reliability-engineer`, `deployment-strategist`27- Coordinate multi-team program milestones without SLO scope → `technical-program-manager`2829## Related skills3031| Need | Skill |32|---|---|33| SRE execution: PRR, incident mitigation, chaos, release gates | `site-reliability-engineer` |34| Incident program, SEV, on-call, postmortems | `incident-management-engineer` |35| CI/CD pipelines, DORA, deploy gates wired to SLO policy | `ci-cd-engineer` |36| Delivery infra, GitOps, alert stack implementation | `devops` |37| IDP golden paths, platform SLOs for portal/scaffold | `platform-engineer` |38| Load testing and latency profiling | `performance-engineer` |39| Rollout strategy and change tiers | `deployment-strategist` |40| Cross-team launch and RAID | `technical-program-manager` |41| Contractual SLA terms and redlines | `commercial-counsel` |42| Data pipeline freshness or warehouse SLAs | `data-system-ops-lead` |4344## Core Workflows4546### 1. Scope and principles4748Service-level taxonomy, user-centric measurement, boundaries with SRE and legal.4950**See `references/sla_slo_scope_and_principles.md`.**5152### 2. SLI selection and measurement5354Choose SLIs, define queries, exclusions, and validation.5556**See `references/sli_selection_and_measurement.md`.**5758### 3. SLO targeting and error budgets5960Targets, windows, budget math, and policy actions.6162**See `references/slo_targeting_and_error_budgets.md`.**6364### 4. Alerting, burn rates, and policies6566Multi-window alerts, routing, and noise control.6768**See `references/alerting_burn_rates_and_policies.md`.**6970### 5. Customer SLA vs internal SLO7172Contract alignment, credits, carve-outs, and communication.7374**See `references/customer_sla_vs_internal_slo.md`.**7576### 6. Reporting, review, and governance7778Cadences, dashboards, specs, and executive reporting.7980**See `references/reporting_review_and_governance.md`.**8182## Outputs8384- **SLO specification** — SLI definition, query, target, window, exclusions, owners, tier85- **Error-budget policy** — thresholds, actions, escalation, link to release policy86- **Burn-rate alert policy** — windows, multipliers, severity, runbook links87- **SLA/SLO alignment matrix** — customer metric ↔ internal SLI, measurement gaps, carve-outs88- **Tier catalog** — criticality definitions with default targets and review cadence89- **SLO review pack** — budget consumed, trends, top burners, proposed target changes90- **Capacity note** — headroom vs latency/availability target (when in scope)9192## Principles9394- **Measure user outcomes** — availability and latency of journeys, not vanity infra metrics95- **Internal SLO stricter than external SLA** — buffer for measurement lag and goodwill96- **Policy before panic** — error-budget actions agreed before budget exhaustion97- **Alerts prove SLO risk** — every page ties to budget burn or imminent breach98- **Govern with data** — reviews change targets from evidence, not anecdotes99- **Hand off execution** — SRE and IM own incident response; this skill owns the level definitions100101## When to load references102103- **Scope and taxonomy** → `references/sla_slo_scope_and_principles.md`104- **SLI design** → `references/sli_selection_and_measurement.md`105- **Targets and budgets** → `references/slo_targeting_and_error_budgets.md`106- **Burn alerts** → `references/alerting_burn_rates_and_policies.md`107- **Customer SLA** → `references/customer_sla_vs_internal_slo.md`108- **Reviews and governance** → `references/reporting_review_and_governance.md`
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