Most practitioners use a scale of 1 to 5, whereby 1 is a critical or major incident, and 5 is a minor request or a 'nice to have.' Most ITSM tools have a priority matrix embedded in their process workflows, so assigning a priority is included in the incident or request logging process. So, for instance, if you have an incident where a service is down, and people need to use it immediately versus a system where it’s down, but no one is planning to use it until the following day, the first incident has greater urgency. Urgency is how quickly the fault needs to be resolved.Impact is generally the severity of the fault, for example, how much downtime or how many end users are affected.They organize incidents, requests, problems, and change based on two factors: When dealing with priority matrices, the first thing you need to be familiar with is their terms. We’ll take a closer look at this later on.

This ITIL methodology is typically used (and it should be applied to) to prioritize incident requests, problems, and change activity in a practical, consistent, and fair way. The ITIL matrix balances the impact and urgency of the customer contact so that it can be assigned, communicated, and resolved appropriately. Thus, in its simplest form, the priority matrix defines the importance of an incident for the service desk analyst so that they know how quickly it needs to be acted on and enable them to set an expectation with the customer on potential resolution timings. The ability to prioritize incidents, requests, and changes is vital for IT and business needs. Ready to get excited about priority matrices? Let’s begin. But in order for you to apply it correctly, we created this complete guide with the basics, its pros and cons, best practices, and its impact on the service desk. Following on from our guide to all things ITIL, it can help you understand what is causing the most pain to your end-users, and direct your support efforts accordingly.ĭone well, an ITIL priority matrix can decrease service downtime, improve customer and employee experience, and make the request and change processes more efficient.

The ITIL priority matrix can be valuable in assigning and directing work in an IT service management (ITSM) environment.

It portfolio priority matrix