Incidents to problems correlation

[mredekar]

Hello All,
We have client whose PM process has been implemented and we want to define a goal for correlation of Incidents to the defined Problems. Please discuss as to how many incidents (by %) should ideally have correlation established with problem tickets?

Thanks in advance.

Cheers!!
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Senior Consultant - ITSM
Certified ITIL V3 Expert

[mnsmith]

This isn't really a question for an ITIL forum, as the answer will be very specific to your clients, however if it was me I would want 0% of my incidents to be related to a problem, because this would mean that my problem management process was very proactive and resolved problems before any incident was raised.

Mick
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Mick Smith
Change, Configuration and Release Manager

[Diarmid]

Manoj,

how can you do that? Certainly not generically because different service environments are susceptible to different kinds of problems and incidents.

Now I see Mick has got in ahead of me. I rather agree with his answer which leads to the conclusion that you can do it relatively by first measuring the current ratio and then setting improvement targets. Even then you could be messed up by changes in the service environment.

By service environment, I intend not only the software and hardware infrastructure and the service support organization and processes, but also the nature of and behaviour of the users and the business drivers behind it all. If you keep all that stable, then you can probably rely on the type and characteristics of incidents remaining the same except that each problem resolution will do away with a set of incidents. Hopefully.

[edit] I think I've persuaded myself that it is unlikely to be a meaningful (in the sense of useful) statistic.
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"Method goes far to prevent trouble in business: for it makes the task easy, hinders confusion, saves abundance of time, and instructs those that have business depending, both what to do and what to hope."
William Penn 1644-1718

[mredekar]

I agree with Mick as well as William. Thanks for the replies.

I need to add little more clarity to know why I a asked for the discussion.
We want teams to improve Incident trend analysis so that they identify problems, create a Problem ticklet and correlate Incidents showing the said trend. PM reslution should follow then. That's the initiative.

At this maturity of Problem management , we want to set a goal for these teams which can imply a 'good' amount of Incident trend analysis and investigation is in place.

Thanks again,
Regards,
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Senior Consultant - ITSM
Certified ITIL V3 Expert

[Diarmid]

Manoj,

the other issue that kyboshes this is that Problem Management should be looking at the highest cost/risk areas rather than most incidents.

I'm not William Penn by the way. Wish I was that clever.
_________________
"Method goes far to prevent trouble in business: for it makes the task easy, hinders confusion, saves abundance of time, and instructs those that have business depending, both what to do and what to hope."
William Penn 1644-1718

[Brian1]

I agree with Diarmid, measuring problem management performance in terms of volume may not be the best approach. Diarmid's suggestion that you measure it in terms of risk/cost provides the base for a stronger conversation with your client.