When you need to execute job steps under a specific security context, proxy account can be used to allow users who are not sysadmin to run them.

Before you can create a proxy account, you first need to create a credential that needs to be linked later. This can be a window service account or a user’s active directory id.

Creating a Credential

1. In the Object Explorer, expand Security node
2. Right-click Credentials node and select New Credential
3. After giving a name to the credential, enter a Windows account and the password

Creating a Proxy

1. Back in the Object Explorer, expand the SQL Server Agent node
2. Right-click Proxies and select New Proxy Account
3. You can use the same proxy name as your credential
4. Select any subsystems you want to enable for the particular proxy

In this example the proxy was created to run SSIS packages, so SQL Server Integration Services Package was checked. That’s all there is to it.

Further Reading

More detailed information can be read from “SQL Server Agent Proxy Account” section from the following book:
SQL Server 2016 High Availability Unleashed