The Operations and Management Area receives occasional proposals for the development and publication of RFCs dealing with operational and management topics. The OPSAWG will serve as the forum to:

- Develop such work items that are not in the scope of an existing WG and do not justify the formation of a new WG or belong to a WG that has already concluded. The OPSAWG mailing list will serve as a discussion forum for such work items when they arise, and the WG will meet to discuss if there are active proposals.
- Find a more appropriate WG in the IETF for the work if OPSAWG is not the right forum.
- Help collect work items and gauge interest to determine whether a new WG should be chartered.

Examples include the advancement of documents on the standards track, application statements, maintenance, and minor extensions of documents that were developed in working groups that have concluded, e.g., IPFIX, network or service level YANG modules, and tools for the Operations and Management Area.

The OPSAWG will undertake only work items that have been proven to have at least a reasonable level of interest from the operators and user community and have a committed number of editors and reviewers. It is not within the scope of the OPSAWG to pick up any failed work of other WG.