incidentmanagement

Incident management is a set of processes and procedures designed to restore normal service operation as quickly as possible following an interruption or degradation. The main goal is to minimize the impact on business operations and maintain agreed service levels. An incident is any event that deviates from normal service expectations, while problems are underlying causes that may require a workaround or permanent fix. Incident management focuses on rapid containment, investigation, resolution, and clear communication to users and stakeholders.

The incident management lifecycle typically includes detection and reporting, logging and categorization, prioritization based on impact and urgency, initial diagnosis, escalation to appropriate support groups, resolution and recovery, and incident closure after confirmation of service restoration. A post-incident review may be conducted to identify lessons learned and areas for improvement. The service desk or help desk often serves as the central point of contact and coordinates with technical teams. Major incidents may trigger a distinct, expedited process with broader communications.

Roles and tools: an incident manager or coordinator, service desk staff, and specialist technicians work with monitoring tools, ticketing and knowledge bases, runbooks, and status communications.

Metrics commonly tracked include mean time to restore (MTTR), total incident volume, SLA attainment, and customer impact. Standards and practices: incident management is a core process in IT service management frameworks such as ITIL; it is aligned with ISO/IEC 20000 and other governance standards. NIST guidelines for IT incident response provide additional context. Modern approaches emphasize automation, proactive alerting, and integration with problem management, change management, and DevOps practices.