Problem Management Practitioners Forum

Thursday January 19, 2012

Jon DowellJorge A. Wong

Agenda

o Housekeeping & Introductionso Define a successful investigationo Makeup of a successful Problem Managero Proactive monitoring of automated alerts for trends/patternso Impact of Change Management on PbMo Feedback & next steps

Housekeeping & Introductions

Fire & WashroomsName, Company, & Experience

Jon Dowell

Jon Dowell• Senior Consultant with KSLD Consulting.• 15 years of experience solving I.T. mysteries.• Facilitation and critical thinking during:

o Major Incidentso Problem investigationso Project quality assessments prior to go-liveo Project warranty periods

• Training and mentoringo Critical thinkingo Root cause analysiso Impact assessmentso Potential risks associated with requests for change

KSLD Consulting specializes in I.T. Problem Management and problem solving for today’s busy world.

Jorge Wong• Over 13 years in IT with Enmax and Accenture

o Senior Systems Analysto Applications Support Team Leado Contact Center Technology Team leado Service Delivery Leado Relationship Managero Problem Manager

• ITIL Background • Focuses on reactive and proactive problem management• Facilitates and conducts problem investigations with cause mapping

analysis method to capture the complete investigation to:o Assess impact and costo Identify root cause(s)o Best solution(s) to prevent recurrence

• Reviews and analyzes data from incident management and pinpoint problems which will give the best results once resolved.

Define a successful investigation

Jorge A. Wong

• Successful Problem Investigations• Must first understand:

• Why do we have problem investigations?• An investigation should be conducted to diagnose the root

cause of the problem.• How long should it take?

• The speed and nature of the investigation will vary depending upon the impact, severity, and urgency of the problem.

• What resources are required?• The appropriate level of resources and expertise should be

applied to finding a resolution corresponding to the priority and service levels targeted.

• Then, use your problem investigation toolkit. • There are many problem solving analysis, diagnosis and

solving techniques available and much research has been done in this area.

• Successful Problem Investigations• Some of the most useful and frequently used techniques

include:• Chronological analysis

• Timeline of events• Pain Value Analysis

• What level of pain has been caused to the organization/business by these problems

• Kepner and Tregoe• Deeper rooted problems

• Cause Mapping• Deeper rooted problems

• 5 Whys• Cause and effect

• Brainstorming• Gather together the relevant people and brainstorm the problem

• Ishikawa Diagrams• Document causes and effects which can be useful in helping identify where

something may be going wrong, or be improved• Pareto Analysis

• Separate important potential causes from more trivial issues

• Use what is appropriate and what you feel comfortable with.

• Successful Problem Investigationso End results

o Expected and desired outcome realizedo Root cause(s) identified and or validatedo Corrective measure(s) identified and or implementedo Effective use of resources throughout the investigation

o Which meanso Increased benefits to the business and the IT organization of:

o Decreased downtimeo Increased business satisfactiono Decreased amount of IT resources spent on incident management

o Other benefitso Influences future cost avoidanceo CMDBo Improved IT service qualityo Incident volume reductiono Permanent solutionso Improved organizational learningo Better first time fix rate at the Service Desko Improves existing processes and procedureso Happy Staff, including Problem Manager!

What makes a successful Problem Manager?

Jon Dowell

1111

Root Cause

Event

1212

Root Cause

Event

Why?

1313

Root Cause

EventTechnical

Failure

Why?

1414

Root Cause

EventTechnical

Failure

Why?Why?

1515

Root Cause

EventPeopleFailure

Technical Failure

Why?Why?

1616

Root Cause

EventPeopleFailure

Technical Failure

Why?Why? Why?

1717

Root Cause

EventPeopleFailure

ProcessFailure

Technical Failure

Why?Why? Why?

1818

Root Cause

EventPeopleFailure

ProcessFailure

Technical Failure

Why?Why? Why? Why?

1919

Root Cause

EventRoot

Cause?PeopleFailure

ProcessFailure

Technical Failure

Why?Why? Why? Why?

Kepner Tregoe has a process called Incident Mapping that performs a similar process.

ThinkReliabilty also has a process called "Cause Mapping"

Brainstorm traits for a good Problem Manager…

Are these good Problem Managers?

What about these individuals…?

What are the traits of a Problem Manager?• Listening

o Ability to listeno Attention to detail… while listening

• Questioningo Open questions… to allow the story to flowo Closed questions… to confirm facts/detailso Ability to ask tough questions and not be side tracked by miss direction.

• Leadership• Ability to lead a teams, resolve conflict, and drive resolution.• Prioritization with a focus on business, not technical, impact.• Strong organization & time management abilities.

• Business writing skills

And…• Understanding of business terminology and concepts.• Understanding of basic technical concepts, architecture, and methodologies.

Helpful educational opportunities?• Dale Carnegie• Kepner Tregoe

• Problem Solving & Decision Making• Incident Mapping

• ThinkReliabilty• Cause Mapping

• FranklinCovey• Focus

• General Business Writing

Proactive monitoring of automated alerts for trends/patterns

Jorge Wong

Alerts and monitoring, why?• Identify future problems.• Prevent problems from happening.• Manage technology infrastructure based on business.• Anticipate and meet the needs of the business.• Effectively manage an increasingly intricate and complex

infrastructure.• Predict and solve problems before they affect business.• Industry analyst reports, IT still discovers about 70% of

problems through the service desk.

• Alerts and monitoring, why?o Reactive to Proactiveo End-user experienceo Application performance and availabilityo Service level commitmentso Outageso Cost avoidanceo Resourceso Productivityo Efficiencyo Capacityo Predictive analyticso MTTRo MTBF

• Alerts and monitoring, what?o Demando Capacityo Availabilityo KPIso Logso Serviceso Networko Serverso User Defined Monitoring and Instant Alerts

Monitor the Windows Event log Alert on hardware and software changes Alert on specific file changes and protection violations Know if disk space is running low on computers Monitor computer online/offline status Know if a server goes down Know when traveling users with notebooks connect Alert message and recipient configuration

• Alerts and monitoring, what?o Pro-active approach

Server's utilization exceeds predefined percentage of total capacity available......raise alert!

Server CPU breaches 90% utilization, or disk becomes 80% full.o Food For Thought

What happens when a server goes down? Alarms, alerts, and notifications are triggered all over the place. The application, database, and operating system may appear to be down. However, this problem behavior may be due to a single point of failure

elsewhere in the network. What is the problem? What is the impact? What is or are the root causes? What is or are the workarounds and resolutions? Or......should we even be worried about it?

Problem Management Categories Re-active Pro-active Predictive Intelligence?

Feedback & next steps

Jorge A. Wong

• Next Stepso Future sessions

Problem Management Practitioner Forums 2012 January 19  (9am - Noon) March 15  (9a - Noon) June 7  (9a - Noon) Followed by casual lunch

Change Management Practitioner Forum 2012 April 12 (9a - Noon) <Tentative>

Business Analyst World Conference 2012 May 7, 8, & 9

Practitioner Forums 2012 Looking for subject ideas Configuration Management Service Level Management Looking for thought leaders and interested participants

15 Minute Break

Thank you!

Appendix

Problem Management: What it is? Is not?

Jorge A. Wong

IT Problem ManagementWhat is a Problem?A cause of one or more Incidents. The cause is not usually known at the time a Problem Record is created.What is Problem Management?The objective of Problem Management is to resolve the root cause of Incidents, and to prevent the recurrence of Incidents related to these errors.What does a Problem Manager do?The Problem Manager is responsible for managing the lifecycle of all Problems. He undertakes research for the root-causes of Incidents and thus ensures the enduring elimination of interruptions. His primary objectives are to prevent Incidents from happening, and to minimize the impact of Incidents that cannot be prevented.

What is Root cause Analysis?

• A standard process of:o Identifying a problem

What happened?o Containing and analyzing the problem

What were the root causes of the problem?o Defining the root cause

What internal options are available to deal with the problem?

o Defining and implementing the actions required to eliminate the root cause What is the cost of acting upon the available options?

o Validating that the corrective action prevented recurrence of problem Which decision options will provide the most cost-

effective solution?

Validate

Follow Up Plan

Complete Plan

Action Plan

Root Cause

Immediate Action

Identify Team

Identify Problem

At a high level, problem investigation looks at:• What were we doing? (Before Major Incident, Incident)• What was the problem?• Why did it happen?• What should be done?• What will we be doing now? (After Problem Investigation)