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Problem Management vs Incident Management Every IT Team Ought to Know

The concepts of problem management and incident management have gradually evolved, and many IT teams now work in integration with DevOps. These more advanced systems call for more complicated responses to incidents and problems. To understand the impact on your operations, it’s necessary to explore the relationship between problems and incidents.

Difference Between Incident Management and Problem Management?

According to ITIL, ‘an Individual incident is an unplanned interruption to a service, or reduction in the quality of a service’ (Global Knowledge, 2021). Incidents refer to a single event that results in a service disruption. A problem is defined as the root cause of an incident and the consequential disruptions. In some cases, a problem leads to just one incident, in other cases, it causes several incidents at once. When an incident occurs your team might identify the cause as one problem or several problems. To prevent future incidents, it’s essential to conduct a root cause analysis, to identify the underlying problem.

Problem Management Vs. Incident Management

According to Micro Focus, ‘Incident Manager enables you to restore service to users, whereas Proactive Problem Management manages the lifecycle of all problems and enables you to identify and remove the underlying causes of major incidents.’ These are separate areas of management, however, the two are closely linked. Responding to incidents means providing a fast solution to restore service. Both incident management process and effective problem management process involve developing more long-term resolutions to rule out similar incidents in the future.

What Processes are Involved in Incident Management?

Service management uses a lifecycle approach to deal with incidents. First, the incident is categorized, prioritized, and logged. In this early stage the goal is to determine the required response, the response speed, and who will resolve the incident. The next stage focuses on escalation rules, for instance, the incident might be escalated to specialist teams. During the escalation timeline, managers may need to apply emergency changes or communicate the situation to shareholders. Resolution is the third step, incidents can be resolved using disaster recovery systems, service desk support, or self-service. The final stage is closure, which involves telling users that the incident has been resolved.

What is the Problem Management Lifecycle?

Problem management means reducing the risk and potential impact of incidents. The idea is to determine the underlying causes and work to resolve these problems. The process involves foreseeing future issues, and controlling these problems before they lead to incidents. Incident management focuses on speed, yet problem management relies on attention to detail. A typical problem management lifecycle works through the following stages:

1. Identifying the problem: Determining what the problem is, and then logging and categorizing. This stage often involves processes like the 5 Whys, brainstorming, or Ishikawa Diagrams.
2. Controlling the problem: Assessing the problem, establishing key error records, and workaround processes.
3. Controlling errors: Testing how effective the workaround processes are, and fixing the error controls in the process.

How Can You Improve Problem Management?

There are many ways that you can improve problem management processes. Firstly, you should implement workarounds when appropriate. Workarounds can be helpful when finding a resolution is time-consuming or challenging. In some instances, workarounds are eventually adopted as permanent solutions. You should make sure that your NOC can adequately support problem management. Many operational processes, including incident and problem management, rely on dedicated tools and 24/7 support. Businesses need to adopt proactive approaches to problem management; with a proactive approach, it’s easier to identify areas for continual service improvement. Business services must also invest in their staff. You should provide advanced technical training, helping your employees to improve their knowledge and skills. You’ll need to ensure that your team has the expertise to solve complex problems.

What are the Advantages of a Problem Management Strategy?

There are many advantages of implementing a problem management strategy. With an effective strategy, you’ll experience fewer incidents and provide a higher quality of service. Improving service quality will help you to boost customer satisfaction and maintain your reputation. Downtime due to service disruptions can be costly, negatively affecting your bottom line. With fewer disruptions, your business will save both time and money. With the support of a dedicated network operation center, businesses can access support on a wide range of technical and current challenges. By implementing problem and incident management strategies you can streamline your operations, and maximize the benefits of your technologies. To future proof your company, adopting advanced technologies and business processes are important.