Incident management: Process, best practices, metrics

Have you ever experienced an interruption while working on a project and ended up disorganized as a result? Most of us have been there. But thankfully, there's a way to resolve these issues in real time without sacrificing team productivity.

Incident management is the process of analyzing and correcting project interruptions as quickly as possible. That means more time spent on delivering impact, not to mention completing the project at hand.

We'll go over incident management and best practices to implement a strategy of your own, so you're ready if and when the next project incident occurs.

What is incident management?

Incident management is the process of identifying, analyzing, and resolving unplanned service disruptions as quickly as possible. The goal is to restore normal operations while minimizing impact on users and the business.

Incident management can be implemented within any team, though it's most common in IT and operations. Teams that rely on incident management include:

• IT teams: Often use it alongside release management as part of ITIL (IT Infrastructure Library) practices.

• Project managers: Use it to prevent hazards from derailing tasks and keep projects on track.

• DevOps and SRE teams: Rely on it to maintain service reliability and respond to outages.

An incident is any disruption to a service or workflow. A few types of incidents that may be solved with incident management include:

• Wi-Fi connectivity issues

• A virus or malware bug

• Email malfunction

• Website lags or navigation errors

• Security incidents

Essentially, an incident is anything that will make life harder for customers or employees.

Creating an incident management template can help your team members know exactly how to resolve incidents when they arise.

Common types of IT incidents

Incidents typically fall into five categories:

• Hardware failures: Issues like hard drive crashes, power supply problems, or overheating servers can immediately take systems offline.

• Network outages: Connectivity problems that prevent users from accessing critical systems or applications.

• Software issues: Application crashes, bugs, or compatibility problems that disrupt workflows.

• Security incidents: Phishing attempts, malware infections, or unauthorized access that threaten data integrity.

• Human errors: Misconfigurations, accidental deletions, or missed updates that cause unexpected disruptions.

By categorizing incidents, your team can develop targeted response procedures for each type and reduce resolution times.

Incidents vs. service requests

It's important to distinguish between incidents and service requests, as each requires a different response approach.

An incident is an unplanned interruption or reduction in the quality of a service. For example, a server going down or an application crashing would be classified as an incident.

A service request is a formal request from a user for a service, such as a password reset, access to a new application, or information about a service. Service requests don't represent service disruptions.

While incidents are handled with a focus on quickly restoring service, service requests are managed through request fulfillment processes with defined delivery timelines. Keeping these workflows separate helps your team prioritize urgent issues while still addressing routine user needs.

Problem management vs. incident management

While there are a few differentiating factors between problem management and incident management, one key difference stands out: Problem management is the process of correcting the root cause of a project hazard, while incident management involves correcting a project interruption with a quick fix.

Here is a simple breakdown:

• Incident management: A quick fix to a single, spontaneous event

• Problem management: A comprehensive fix of a large-scale issue that is halting business operations

While both systems are needed, they provide different outcomes and happen at different times in the project lifecycle. Incident management occurs when an incident occurs, while problem management seeks to solve the underlying issue after the fact to prevent it from happening again.

IT incident management approaches: ITIL, DevOps, and SRE

Organizations typically adopt one of three ways for incident management, often blending elements to fit their needs:

Benefits of incident management

Incidents can slow projects and waste valuable resources. They can also disrupt your operations, sometimes leading to the loss of crucial data.

Effective incident management delivers measurable benefits:

• Reduced downtime: Faster response times mean quicker recovery and less business disruption.

• Increased team productivity: Clear processes free your team to focus on high-impact work instead of firefighting.

• Improved customer experience: Reliable service builds trust with users and stakeholders.

• Prevention of future incidents: Documentation and analysis help you address root causes over time.

• Greater visibility: Tracking incidents creates transparency across your organization.

What are the 5 steps of an incident response plan?

An incident response plan consists of five important steps. Each of these steps makes up the incident management life cycle and helps teams track and address project hazards.

There are five steps in an incident management plan:

1. Incident identification

2. Incident categorization

3. Incident prioritization

4. Incident response

5. Incident closure

Each step builds on the previous one to efficiently move incidents through the process. Without an effective response plan, your projects risk delays, especially for IT and DevOps teams, where technical issues can escalate quickly.

This is somewhat similar to a change control process, with the main difference being a project change vs. a major incident.

Let's learn more about the five steps of an effective incident management system, how to spot and resolve issues when they arise, and how resource allocation comes into the mix.

1. Incident identification

The first step in an incident response plan is identifying the incident. An issue can arise in almost any part of a project, whether that's internal, vendor-related, or customer-facing.

To identify an incident, you should include the following:

• Name or ID number

• Description

• Date

• Incident manager

Each of these will be helpful for references later on, especially if you have a problem management plan in place. This way, you can find the root cause of the incident and ensure it doesn't happen again.

2. Incident categorization

Incidents need to be accurately categorized to be resolved correctly. Categorization allows your team members to:

1. Quickly find a solution if this incident ever arises again.

2. Prioritize incidents correctly and sort them by urgency.

Categorizing incidents by urgency can help ensure they're addressed in an order that makes sense. For example, a chatbot lagging and the entire website being down carry different weights.

Once you've categorized an incident, make sure it's sorted into an appropriate section for future reference and so the right team can keep an eye on it. There isn't a hard-and-fast rule for incident management categories, so focus on ways your team can easily identify future issues based on the type of incident.

3. Incident prioritization

Once an incident is identified and categorized, you can move on to incident prioritization. There are a couple of key things to consider when it comes to ranking project incidents by importance:

• Which other incidents are you prioritizing against

• What other tasks need to be completed

Since incident management focuses on immediate fixes, you should prioritize resolving issues that will have an immediate impact. You'll also need to prioritize incidents against other project tasks that need to be completed.

Once you've considered both prioritization factors, you can use a priority matrix to get started on your high-priority incidents first.

4. Incident response

Once the incident is correctly labeled and prioritized, you can dig into the meat of the issue. Depending on how it's labeled, the incident should be sent to the team most equipped to troubleshoot. Quick response times are key to incident management.

In some cases, your response team may not be able to find a solution. When that happens, they'll escalate the issue to another team for further investigation and troubleshooting. Keeping track of incidents and the teams assigned to them can be tricky, but it's easier with the right work management software.

5. Incident resolution and closure

Once the problem is solved to everyone's satisfaction, you're ready to close the ticket and log the incident as complete. You'll want to keep any documentation you've created during the above steps in a shared workspace for future reference.

During your post-mortem project meeting, you may want to talk through any incidents that occurred during the project. This can be a great transition into the problem management phase of a project, where you work to solve the root cause and create a more effective meeting.

Major incident management

Not all incidents are created equal. A major incident is an emergency-level outage or loss of service that significantly affects business operations or a large number of users.

What qualifies as a major incident?

Organizations typically define severity levels to classify incidents. The top severity levels (often called SEV 1 or SEV 2) are considered major incidents. Examples include:

• Complete service outages affecting all users

• Security breaches involving sensitive data

• Critical system failures that halt business operations

How major incident response differs

Major incidents require:

• Dedicated response teams: A specific group of responders, often led by an incident commander, who drop other work to focus on resolution.

• Clear communication protocols: Regular updates to stakeholders, executives, and affected users.

• Faster escalation: Faster paths to senior engineers or leadership when needed.

• Post-incident review: A thorough analysis after resolution to prevent recurrence.

Having a separate playbook for major incidents, alongside a broader crisis management plan, ensures your team can respond with urgency when it matters most.

Incident management best practices

Now that you know what goes into an incident response plan, it's time to create your own incident log. With a few best practices and an example incident response log, you'll be able to document and properly respond to incidents when they arise.

Here's an example incident log to inspire your own.

View our template gallery or create your own custom log to get started.

Some key incident management best practices include keeping your log organized, properly training and communicating with your team, and automating processes if possible. Let's dive into seven incident management best practices.

1. Identify early and often

Incidents can be tricky to spot, but the sooner you diagnose them, the easier they are to handle.

The best thing to do is set aside time to examine your projects and processes for potential issues regularly. This will allow you to know precisely what problems are occurring and which might escalate to full-blown incidents.

Tip: Once you identify an incident, document it in your incident log.

2. Keep your work tidy

Organization is key in any part of project management, but especially when documenting problems that could have long-lasting effects. You can do this by cleaning up your drives often and keeping descriptions brief.

If you feel more information should be added to your response log, but there isn't enough room, consider linking to an external space or document where more detailed responses live.

Tip: Create a baseline character count to keep descriptions short and prevent disorganization.

3. Educate your team

Train your team on any accidents that may occur and what to do if they spot a potential problem.

While formal training isn't always needed, it's a good idea to take them through any programs they'll be working in and any potential issues. That way, they can help flag incidents before they get out of hand.

Tip: Set up a meeting to walk your team through your incident log and any other needed tools.

4. Automate tasks

Business process automation can help make incident management a breeze. While it can be difficult to set up, it can save you a ton of time in the long run.

With the right automation software, also known as ITSM tools, you can set incidents to be automatically flagged. While this won't be a be-all-and-end-all solution, it can help catch issues that you may have missed otherwise.

Tip: Don't forget to check automated tasks often. Setting and forgetting can result in mistakes being missed.

5. Communicate in one place

Communication can become scattered, especially in virtual environments. In fact, teams spend 30% more time on duplicate work when information is siloed. Keep all incident-related collaboration in a shared space so your team can quickly reference updates.

Tip: Set up a meeting to walk your team through your incident log and any other needed tools.

6. Use project management tools

There are numerous tools you can use to create and maintain your incident management plan, project management software being one of them.

Not only can it help organize work and communication, but it can also help your team build workflows and align goals to the work needed to complete them. The more confusion there is around communication and tasks, the longer it will take to solve incidents in real time.

Tip: Use a project management calendar to visualize work and deadlines in one place.

7. Continue improving

Just as with any plan you put in place, embracing continuous improvement is essential to refining your approach over time. Your first run at an incident response plan will likely look different from your 100th. Over time, you'll learn ways to become more efficient, making it easier to spot incidents before they turn into problems.

While practice makes perfect, there are other ways to expand your knowledge base. Project tracking and analyzing key performance indicators (KPIs) can help you and your team learn from your mistakes.

Tip: Continue your education by learning how to create a resource management plan next.

Key incident management metrics

Track these key performance indicators (KPIs) to measure effectiveness and identify areas for improvement:

Review these metrics regularly with your team to spot patterns and improve your incident response.

Streamline incident management with the right tools

Now that you're prepared on how to create an incident management process, handling project incidents will be a breeze. By following the best practices outlined above, you can ensure your plan is as effective as possible, saving both time and money.

With a clear process in place and the right tools supporting your team, managing incidents becomes far less chaotic. Whether you're handling routine disruptions or major service outages, Asana helps teams track incidents, assign owners, communicate in real time, and improve over time. Get started with Asana to bring clarity and accountability to your incident management process.

Frequently asked questions about incident management