Techniques and mechanisms for establishing and implementing performance objectives for an application based at least in part on a workload type of the application. A system includes a storage system on which an application imposes a workload by utilizing storage resources of the storage system, and a performance level has been associated with the application. A workload type is associated with the application based on the type of workload, and a performance objective is determined for the application based on the performance level and the workload type of the application. The storage resources are manipulated to achieve the performance objective.