What is Incident Management?

Incident Management is an IT Service Management (ITSM) practice that focuses on responding to and resolving unplanned interruptions or degradations in IT services. The goal is to restore normal operations as quickly as possible while minimizing business impact.

In ITIL, Incident Management is a core process typically handled by a service desk. While Incident Management also applies to cybersecurity (where it involves security breaches and threat containment), this discussion is specifically about managing IT service disruptions.

What is an IT incident?

An IT incident is any unexpected event that disrupts or reduces the quality of an IT service. In ITIL, an incident is defined as an event that causes a service outage or degradation.

For example, a server crash preventing users from accessing an application, a network failure slowing down internal systems, or a software bug causing repeated errors all qualify as incidents. The focus of Incident Management is to resolve these issues quickly to restore normal service levels.

Incident vs. service request vs. problem

In ITSM, not every issue reported to the service desk is an incident. Some requests follow a structured process, while others require deeper investigation. The three key terms to distinguish are:

• Incidents: Unplanned disruptions that need immediate attention to restore service.
• Service requests: Routine requests for access, information, or changes that follow a predefined process (e.g., requesting VPN access or a new software installation).
• Problems: The underlying causes of incidents. While Incident Management focuses on quick resolution, Problem Management investigates and eliminates root causes to prevent recurrence.

For example, if users report that a critical application is down, that is an incident requiring urgent resolution. If a user submits a request for access to a file storage system, that is a service request, as there is no disruption. If the same application crashes repeatedly due to a software defect, the problem is the defect itself, which needs further investigation and resolution.

Why is ITIL Incident Management important?

A structured Incident Management process ensures that IT teams handle service disruptions in a consistent, efficient, and organized manner. Without a defined approach, teams may respond reactively, leading to miscommunication, delays, and unresolved incidents that affect business operations.

Having a standardized Incident Management process means that all team members follow the same workflows, responsibilities are clearly assigned, and escalation procedures are in place. 

This reduces guesswork during critical situations, ensuring that incidents are resolved systematically rather than on an ad-hoc basis. It also allows organizations to track trends, improve response times, and refine processes over time based on data-driven insights.

5 benefits of Incident Management

Implementing ITIL Incident Management provides several advantages:

1. Faster service restoration: A well-defined process helps IT teams quickly diagnose, prioritize, and resolve incidents, minimizing costly downtime and maintaining business continuity.
    
2. Greater operational stability: Organizations can keep critical business functions running smoothly by preventing incidents from escalating into larger outages.
    
3. More efficient resource utilization: Structured workflows ensure IT teams focus on high-priority incidents first, avoiding wasted effort on less urgent issues.
    
4. Improved user satisfaction: When users receive prompt support and clear communication, they experience fewer disruptions, leading to higher confidence in IT services.
    
5. Enhanced reporting and continuous improvement: Tracking incidents provides valuable data for identifying recurring issues, refining processes, and ensuring compliance with regulatory requirements.

Types of Incident Management

Incident Management is not a one-size-fits-all process. Depending on the operational model and team structure, organizations may handle incidents through different approaches. The three most common types are IT Incident Management, DevOps Incident Management, and Site Reliability Engineering (SRE) Incident Management. 

Here's how each type works:

1. IT Incident Management

This is the traditional model often associated with IT Service Management (ITSM) and ITIL. It focuses on identifying, managing, and resolving IT-related incidents — such as system outages, application failures, and network issues — quickly to minimize disruption to business operations.

• Key characteristics:
  • Structured ticketing and escalation processes.
  • Incident prioritization based on business impact.
  • Root cause analysis and follow-up actions to prevent recurrence.
• Best for: Companies that rely on structured processes, clear escalation paths, and accountability across teams.

2.DevOps Incident Management

In the DevOps model, the focus is on collaboration between development and operations teams to handle incidents quickly and improve overall system reliability. Incidents are handled in an agile, continuous delivery environment, where developers, operations, and quality assurance work together to address issues quickly.

• Key characteristics:
  • Emphasis on fast feedback and continuous improvement.
  • Incident Management is integrated into the software development lifecycle.
  • Incident resolutions may include immediate fixes or patches pushed through CI/CD pipelines.
  • DevOps tools and automation are frequently used for rapid incident detection and resolution.
• Best for: Organizations with rapid release cycles that require continuous monitoring, frequent updates, and quick issue remediation.

3. SRE Incident Management

Site Reliability Engineering (SRE) is a discipline that combines software engineering and operations to ensure that systems are reliable, scalable, and efficient. In SRE, Incident Management focuses on minimizing downtime and service disruptions through automation, monitoring, and capacity planning.

• Key characteristics:
  • Heavy use of monitoring and alerting systems to detect incidents before they escalate.
  • Postmortems and blameless retrospectives to improve systems and processes.
  • Service Level Objectives (SLOs) and Service Level Indicators (SLIs) help prioritize incidents based on their impact on end-users.
  • Focus on long-term solutions, automation, and building resilient systems.
     
• Best for: Tech-heavy organizations that operate at scale and require continuous monitoring, automation, and strong service reliability standards.

The IT Incident Management process

The Incident Management process follows a structured approach to ensure that IT disruptions are identified, assessed, and resolved efficiently. It typically consists of the following stages:

1. Incident identification

Incidents can be detected in two ways:

• User-reported – Employees, customers, or end-users report an issue via a service portal, email, phone call, or chat.
   
• Automated monitoring – IT monitoring tools detect performance issues, outages, or security threats and generate alerts.

At this stage, the main goal is to recognize that an incident has occurred and ensure it enters the management workflow.

2. Incident logging and categorization

Once identified, the incident is recorded in an IT Service Management tool with relevant details, such as the date and time of occurrence, the affected system or service, and user-reported symptoms.

The info will also include the type of incident to deal with. These can be:

• Service degradation: Here, a system is still functioning but slower or with limited capability (e.g., delayed email delivery).
• Service outage: A service is completely unavailable (e.g., company website down).
• Security incidents: Unauthorized access, malware infections, phishing attempts.
• Hardware failures: Issues with servers, storage, or network devices.
• Software issues: Bugs, crashes, or errors in applications.

Accurate categorization helps direct the incident to the appropriate support team and enables better reporting on recurring issues.

3. Initial diagnosis and prioritization

At this stage, support teams analyze the issue and assign a priority level using a priority matrix that helps them assess incident severity. It considers the following:

• Impact: The number of users, departments, or business functions affected.
• Urgency: How quickly the issue needs to be resolved to prevent further consequences.

For example, a company-wide email outage affecting all employees would be a high-priority incident, while a single user unable to access a non-essential application might be classified as low priority.

4. Investigation and resolution

Support teams attempt to diagnose the root cause and apply a fix. If a Known Error Database (KEDB) exists, they can check for documented solutions. Otherwise, they may:

• Perform troubleshooting steps.
• Restart affected services.
• Roll back recent system changes.
• Apply temporary workarounds.

If the issue is complex or beyond the first-level support team's expertise, it may be escalated to a specialized team.

5. Resolution and service recovery

Once the incident is resolved, IT verifies that the affected service is fully restored and operating as expected. In some cases, users may need to confirm that their issue is fixed before finalizing the resolution.

6. Closure and documentation

After resolution, the incident is formally closed. Key details are documented, including:

• What caused the incident.
• The steps taken to resolve it.
• Whether preventive measures are needed to avoid recurrence.

This is also where post-incident reviews come in to ensure continuous improvement. The data you recollect is valuable for post-incident analysis, identifying trends, and improving the overall Incident Management process.

InvGate Service Management as your Incident Management software

To enhance your IT Incident Management program, you need to implement an ITSM solution. InvGate Service Management provides the tools needed to log, track, and resolve incidents efficiently while organizing the IT team's workload.

Here are some key features that support Incident Management:

• Ticketing Management: Users can report incidents, and IT teams can track them through resolution. The system facilitates incident categorization, root cause analysis, and escalations, ensuring that issues are handled by the right team at the right time.
   
• Self-service portal: Users can submit incidents and access a knowledge base to find solutions independently, reducing the workload on IT support.
   
• Omnichannel support:  Incidents can be reported via multiple channels, including email, chat, and service portals, making it easier for users to reach IT support.
   
• Workflow automation: With InvGate Service Management you can build custom workflows, allowing you to define and automate your incident resolution process according to your organization's specific needs. You can set up workflows that automatically assign tickets to the right team, send notifications to users, escalate incidents that are not addressed within certain time frames, and more.
   
• Integration with IT Asset Management (ITAM): The tool natively integrates with InvGate Asset Management, unlocking the power of combining ITSM with ITAM. When incidents are linked to IT assets in InvGate Asset Management, IT teams can more easily identify patterns or recurring issues with specific devices, software, or hardware. This also helps reduce downtime, as asset information is available right within the Incident Management system for faster resolution.
   
• AI-powered features: InvGate Service Management leverages AI through features like Major Incident Detection. It analyzes patterns in reported incidents. For instance, if multiple users report similar issues, the system automatically suggests classifying the issue as a major incident and notifying IT coordinators. This way, you can identify and prevent these issues from escalating further and ensure business continuity. 
   
• Reporting and dashboards: Finally, IT teams can use the reporting and dashboards to monitor incident trends, track resolution performance, and identify areas for improvement.

5 Incident Management best practices

To optimize your Incident Management process, consider these best practices:

1. Establish clear incident categorization and prioritization: Define how incidents are classified and prioritize them based on impact and urgency to ensure critical issues receive immediate attention.
    
2. Implement a knowledge base: Document resolutions for common incidents so users and IT teams can quickly access solutions, reducing repetitive tickets.
    
3. Define escalation paths: Ensure that complex incidents are escalated to the right support level without unnecessary delays, preventing prolonged service disruptions.
    
4. Automate workflows: Use automation for ticket assignments, notifications, and escalations to streamline the process and reduce manual intervention.
    
5. Analyze incident trends: Review incident data regularly to identify recurring issues, address root causes, and improve service quality over time.

Now, there’s another aspect you shouldn't overlook: communication. During an ongoing incident, especially when it is a core or major incident, clear and assertive communication is vital, as well as having very well defined roles.

It will help manage user expectations and avoid confusion. In our podcast, guest Georgina Otubela explained that it’s vital to maintain transparency and avoid over-promising. In her own words:

"The best thing to do is be transparent and say what you know right now, not 'we think we got it, we think we know the underlying cause, and we think we're gonna have this back on.' Because you're delivering false hope.”

Georgina Otubela, IT Service Management Leader

Episode 99 of Ticket Volume

Resources to keep exploring the Incident Management practice

To further deepen your understanding of Incident Management and enhance your practice, here are some valuable resources to explore:

• Ticket Volume - Episode 95: The Road to Zero Incidents: John Gordon on Preventative Incident Management

In this episode, we explore advanced preventative Incident Management methodologies driving toward a zero-incident environment. Matt Beran, our host, explores with John Gordon how IT teams can transition from reactive problem-solving to proactive prevention, uncovering strategies that minimize system vulnerabilities and create more resilient operational frameworks.

• Free e-book: Unlocking Quality in Service

This eBook is a guide to transforming IT Service Management (ITSM) through strategic quality improvement. It gives you a precise roadmap for elevating service delivery, measuring performance, and implementing advanced monitoring techniques.

• InvGate Academy - How to Define Incident Severity Levels For Your Service Desk

Master incident Severity Levels in just a few minutes! In this video, you’ll learn how to properly classify incidents to transform your IT operations, streamline response times, and prioritize critical issues.