About Identifying a Problem
The Problem Manager routinely browses through incidents to determine the potential for problems. For example, the Problem Manager may identify a problem if there is a pronounced spike in the number of incidents logged against the same service or against the same category within a short period of time.
You can identify a problem in two ways:
Identifying a Problem Using the Dashboard
This process refers to the default Problem Manager dashboard. Your administrator might have configured this dashboard differently.
Follow these steps to identify a problem using the Problem dashboard:
- Log in to the application as a Problem Manager.
- Open the Problem dashboard.
- Open an incident that is a problem.
- From the Action Menu, choose System > Add Problem.
- Enter information into the problem record. See Working with Problems.
- Click Save.
Identifying a Problem Using a Saved Search
This process refers to the default Problem Manager dashboard. Your administrator might have configured this dashboard differently.
Follow these steps to identify a problem using a saved search:
- Log in to the application as a Problem Manager.
- Open the Incident workspace.
- From the Saved Searches menu, choose Active Incidents this Year.
- Open the related incident record.
- From the Action Menu, choose System > Add Problem.
- Enter information into the problem record. See Working with Problems.
- Click Save.
Investigating a Problem
As a Problem Manager, you should routinely check for newly-logged problems and investigate them. If you determine that the logged problem is not actually a problem, you can set its status to canceled. Only Problem Managers can set the status of a problem to canceled.
Perform these steps for problems that are in the logged state:
- Log in to the application as a Problem Manager.
- Open the problem to investigate.
- Set the status to investigation.
- Provide the details of the diagnostic activities. Under the Activity History tab, click New > New Notes.
- Enter detailed investigating information, then click Save. See About Activity History for more information on this feature.
- Add information to the problem as needed. See Working with Problems.
- Identify individuals from the Problem Review Board to help in the investigation or to help oversee the problem process. See Working with the Problem Review Board.
- Click Save.
The system notifies the problem owner of the status change. If you added an ad-hoc reviewer from the Problem Review Board tab, the system notifies the reviewer.