How is priority calculated for an incident?

Priority for an incident is calculated based on the concepts of impact and urgency.

Impact refers to the extent of the effect that an incident has on the business, which can range from affecting a single user to impacting the entire organization. Urgency, on the other hand, indicates how quickly an incident needs to be resolved to minimize disruption or damage. By combining these two factors, organizations can classify incidents effectively to determine the order in which they should be addressed.

For example, an incident that affects multiple critical services with high urgency would typically have a high priority. This prioritization ensures that resources are allocated efficiently and that the most critical incidents are resolved promptly, preserving business operations and service quality.

Other methods of determining priority, such as using service level agreements or staff availability, do not encapsulate the immediate need for resolving incidents in context with how they affect users and business functions. Such factors might play a role in overall resource management but do not directly contribute to the priority setting for incidents.