Who's Accountable for Long Service Delivery Times?

[bubbisthedog]

Hi,

I'm new to Problem Management and was wanting to know who, according to ITIL, is responsible (accountable) for the following scenario:

User contacts Service Desk for simple incident. Incident is assigned to IT Resource since Service Desk could not resolve. Incident sits there for a month with no response to the User or resolution.

Would this be the Service Owner? If not, who is responsible (accountable) for this delay in service? We do not have SLOs and SLAs yet, so 'a long time' is subjective; but a month is far too long to resolve a simple incident --everyone here at my company knows that.

Thanks!

[Diarmid]

Before I start, [no that's wrong I have just started] what on earth has problem management got to do with the scenario you describe? Have you missed out some vital part of the narrative? you tell of an incident unresolved after a month. you make no mention of a problem. although I might suggest that you have some kind of management problem in these circumstances.

Now, as to your question:

I'm afraid you are going to find that while ITIL probably suggests it is a good idea to have someone responsible for this as for any other aspect of service manager, it is unlikely to make strong recommendation on whom that role should fall.

Also this is nothing to do with SLOs or SLAs.
(SLOs???)

I'm a bit concerned for your organization that you are thinking of developing SLAs before grasping the simple concept of management procedure and the formal attribution of authority and responsibility throughout your processes.

I am rather assuming that you do not have documented management procedures, because if you did, then your question would be readily answered by referring to them.

For lack of a documented management system, I would suggest that probably no one is responsible for ensuring that incidents are resolved rather than forgotten about. Or to put it another way the IT services manager (i.e. the high heid yin in IT) is the only person against whom the responsibility might lie.
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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."
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[bubbisthedog]

"...what on earth has problem management got to do with the scenario you describe?"

That's the same thing I asked IT Management! They contort ITIL Problem Management, thinking that an prolonged unresolved incident can be seen as a "problem." I have repeatedly said, 'a *problem* is an unknown cause of an incident or incidents, nothing to do with how long it takes to resolve them!'

Accountability is a HUGE issue in our (dis)organization, and, no, there is not a documented management system.

Anyway, in the scenario I provided, I would hold the IT Resource and, perhaps, their Manager, accountable. They both are responsible for ensuring incidents are resolved in a timely manner, and should provide response to Users as to why incidents are resolved as quickly as expected.

I wish this fell under an ITIL role, but, oh, well...

Thanks for the feedback!