Problem Management Best Practices www.techexcel.com There should be a designated Problem Manager whose responsibility is to idenfy problems during daily operaons as well as through historical reporng that shows recurring incidents. Depending on the size of your organizaon, this may not be a full me job, but is a necessary role. Addionally, the Service Desk Manager should be in direct communicaon with the Problem Manager, as he or she will likely be the first alerted when a cluster of Crical or High Priority incidents are opened. The primary objecves of Problem Management are: 1) To uncover a diagnosis of the root cause of the problem 2) To provide either a temporary fix or workaround to the problem 3) To control the error by leaving the fix in place or permanently repairing the condion Step 1: Define Roles and Responsibilities Step 2: Focus on Root Cause Tip: Schedule regular incident reviews. Create a weekly meeng to review all incidents where the root cause was not removed. Sample Problem Management Process TechExcel ServiceWise includes a graphical workflow editor. With this editor, organizaons may ‘draw’ their process into place. To the right is an example of how an organizaon might choose to implement the problem mangement process. Create Problem Record Change Implemented Classify Problem Request Change Problem Resolved Known Error New New Problem Classificaon Invesgate Provide Workaround - Known Error Pending Change Problem Resolved or Permanent Workaround Invesgaon and Analysis Further Invesgaon Create a documented process for Root Cause Analysis that describes what techniques will be used. These can include brainstorming, Ishikawa diagrams, Causal Mapping or any other technique that successfully uncovers the underlying cause. This process should be “group think”, and the group composed of representaves from any possible area of breakdown. Once a root cause and a workaround are in place, a problem becomes a “known error.” The workaround should be communicated to all end-users who have submied an incident and the incidents placed in a “resolved” status. The Problem record should be in a “known error” status. Addionally, the known error and workaround should be published to the knowledgebase for resoluon at the Service Desk. Connue to open related incidents as reported and link them to the problem record, but if the published workaround has been implemented with the end-user, the newly related incidents should be in a “resolved” state. This should stop SLA calculaons against the incidents, but will not allow full closure unl the problem is resolved and closed. Once the environment has calmed down and producvity restored to the end-users through the workaround, Problem Managers must decide if permanently fixing the root cause is economically viable or if the workaround should become permanent. Step 3: Make a “Known Error” Known Problem Management (PM) is one of the components in the ITIL Service Support area. The primary focus of PM is to idenfy causes of service issues and commission correcve work to prevent recurrences. PM processes are both reacve and proacve - reacve in solving problems in response to incidents, and proacve in idenfying and solving potenal incidents before they occur. A Step-by-Step Guide ITIL Step Step by
Problem Management (PM) is one of the components in the ITIL Service Support area. The primary focus of PM is to identify causes of service issues and commission corrective work to prevent recurrences. PM processes are both reactive and proactive - reactive in solving problems in response to incidents, and proactive in identifying and solving potential incidents before they occur.
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1. Problem Management Best Practices StepITIL by Step A
Step-by-Step GuideProblem Management (PM) is one of the components
in the ITIL Service Support area. The primary focus of PM is to
identifycauses of service issues and commission corrective work to
prevent recurrences. PM processes are both reactive andproactive -
reactive in solving problems in response to incidents, and
proactive in identifying and solving potential incidentsbefore they
occur. Step 1: De ne Roles and ResponsibilitiesThere should be a
designated Problem Manager whose responsibility is to identify
problems during daily operations as wellas through historical
reporting that shows recurring incidents. Depending on the size of
your organization, this may not be afull time job, but is a
necessary role. Additionally, the Service Desk Manager should be in
direct communication with theProblem Manager, as he or she will
likely be the rst alerted when a cluster of Critical or High
Priority incidents are opened.The primary objectives of Problem
Management are:1) To uncover a diagnosis of the root cause of the
problem2) To provide either a temporary x or workaround to the
problem3) To control the error by leaving the x in place or
permanently repairing the condition Sample Problem Management
Process Step 2: Focus on Root Cause New Create a documented process
for Root Cause Analysis that TechExcel ServiceWise includes a
describes what techniques will be used. These can include graphical
workow editor. With brainstorming, Ishikawa diagrams, Causal
Mapping or any this editor, organizations may Create Problem draw
their process into place. other technique that successfully
uncovers the underlying cause. To the right is an example of Record
how an organization might This process should be group think, and
the group composed of choose to implement the representatives from
any possible area of breakdown. problem mangement process. New
Problem Tip: Classify Schedule regular incident reviews. Create a
Problem weekly meeting to review all incidents where the root cause
was not removed. Classication Step 3: Make a Known Error Known
Investigate Once a root cause and a workaround are in place, a
problem becomes a known error. The workaround should be Further
communicated to all end-users who have submitted an incident
Investigation Investigation and Analysis and the incidents placed
in a resolved status. The Problem record should be in a known error
status. Additionally, the Request Provide Workaround - known error
and workaround should be published to the Change Known Error
knowledgebase for resolution at the Service Desk. Continue to open
related incidents as reported and link them to the problem record,
but if the published workaround has been implemented Pending Known
Change with the end-user, the newly related incidents should be in
a Error resolved state. This should stop SLA calculations against
the incidents, but will not allow full closure until the problem is
Change Problem Resolved or resolved and closed. Once the
environment has calmed down Implemented Permanent Workaround and
productivity restored to the end-users through the workaround,
Problem Managers must decide if permanently Problem xing the root
cause is economically viable or if the workaround Resolved should
become permanent. www.techexcel.com
2. Problem Management Best Practices A Step-by-Step GuideStep
4: Weigh the ROIIf the return on investment (ROI) for repairing a
root cause will not be achievable in six months, consider leaving
theworkaround in place. If the repair of the root cause is feasible
or necessary regardless of length of ROI, theProblem Manager and
assignees may have to initiate a Request for Change (RFC). This
change record is governed by theChange Management process and the
same way incidents are linked to problems, a problem should be
linked to the RFC.When the RFC is successfully implemented and
closes, it will in turn allow the Problem record to be closed and
any associatedincidents will be closed. Step 5: Focus on Root Cause
Dont automatically close Problem records when an RFC is complete.
They should be reviewed by the Problem Manager to assure that any
workaround in place is backed out, if necessary, in order to
eectively use the changed conguration item. Additionally, this
allows for total contact ownership and customer satisfaction. Tip:
Identify actual causes vs. blame: Even though actual cause can
sometimes be attributed to human error, the real cause may be due
to lack of understanding of the process or training.Step 6: Be
Customer-centricFocus on customers, not infrastructure. The
tendency is to focus on the most troublesome infrastructure.
However,the goal of eective IT Service Management is to focus on
customers. To this end, Problem Managers should sort
recurringincidents by line of business and address the business
unit with the most issues. An example of how Best Practice Problem
Management might ow: 1) Many users/customers lose their email
connectivity and submit incidents 2) The Service Desk Manager
alerts the Problem Manager and a problem record is opened and
assigned to a technical resource (assignee) with the incidents
linked to it 3) The root cause is determined to be a particular
Exchange server that has a bad internal power supply 4) The
workaround is to temporarily recongure any end-user of that server
to use another Exchange server 5) The Problem Manager/assignee
initiates an Emergency Change Request and gets the okay to
recongure 6) The workaround is distributed to the users/customers
with incidents as well as any other users of the server who have
not yet contacted the Service Desk 7) Linked incidents are put into
a resolved state 8) The workaround and associated problem number
are distributed to the Service Desk for any new callers 9) The
Problem Manager/assignee determines the cost of the new power
supply and repair can be recovered in 1 month. 10) The Problem
Manager initiates a Request for Change (RFC) to repair the Exchange
Server 11) The RFC goes through the Change Management process and
is successfully implemented. The last task of this change is to
return the end-users to the original Exchange Server 12) The
Problem Manager is notied of the successful change and closes the
problem 13) The associated incidents are either closed or, if the
company practices Total Contact Ownership, the usres/customers are
contacted by the Service Desk to verify that they have changed back
to the original server and they are satised that the incident can
be closed. www.techexcel.com