Priority matrices
When adding an order of any type in, for instance, Service Manager, Service Desk or Reservations TSIs, end users can enter the severity and an impact of the incident associated with the order.
The severity of an incident is a numeric value that typically indicates how serious the incident is. For example, on a scale of 1 to 10, 10 could be used to describe a life-threatening situation such as a power outage occurring in a medical facility.
The impact of an incident is a numeric value that typically indicates the number of people affected by the incident. For example, on a scale of 1 to 10, 10 could be used to describe the failure of a major server that jeopardizes the entire IT network within an organization, thus affecting nearly everyone in the organization.
 | The severity and impact scales used are purely arbitrary can be in either ascending or descending order, however this order should be the same for both quantities. These parameters are set up by the Planon Administrator in Supporting data > Priority Matrix. |
A priority matrix multiplies the impact and severity of an order and then matches this number to its correct priority range. Since each priority range has a defined priority associated with it, orders with a specified impact and severity are automatically assigned a priority for their completion.
When adding a priority matrix in Priority Matrix, the Planon Administrator defines all of the possible impacts and severities that are available to be assigned to orders as well as priority ranges. When adding a priority range, the Planon Administrator specifies a minimum and maximum value for the product of impact and severity, thus defining a numeric range. The administrator then specifies a priority (time to be completed in) for that priority range.
If a priority matrix is added and is then assigned to an order type in, for instance, Service Manager, Service Desk or Reservations, Planon ProCenter will automatically specify a priority for a new order of that type based on the Severity and Impact values entered.
| | You can also assign a priority matrix to a standard order. Whenever an order is generated that is based on this standard order, the specified priority matrix is applied. For details on standard orders, see Maintaining standard orders. |
Example of planning and adding a priority matrix
Let’s assume that we want to add a priority matrix to Planon ProCenter and then assign this matrix to all orders of type Request.
We will use severity and impact scales of 1 to 6, whereby, the least severity and impact will be of value 1, and the greatest severity and impact will be 6.
Our impact x severity product will therefore range from 1 to 36.
When we add our new priority matrix in Priority Matrix, we would then add six impacts and six severities.
Impact/ Severity | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
1 | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 |
2 | 2 | 4 | 6 | 8 | 10 | 12 |
3 | 3 | 6 | 9 | 12 | 15 | 18 |
4 | 4 | 8 | 12 | 16 | 20 | 24 |
5 | 5 | 10 | 15 | 20 | 25 | 30 |
6 | 6 | 12 | 18 | 24 | 50 | 36 |
We could also add six priority ranges for the products of these impacts and assign priorities (completion times) as follows:
Impact x Severity | Priority (completion time) |
|---|---|
1 to 6 | Whenever possible |
7 to 12 | Within 1 month |
13 to 18 | Within 1 week |
19 to 24 | Within 2 days |
25 to 30 | Within 4 hrs |
31 to 36 | Immediate |
Once the priority matrix is complete, we can then specify it as the default priority matrix for the relevant order type (in this case, Requests) in Field Definer.
| | For information on the scenarios explaining how a company calendar is applied depending on the interval for the priority, refer to Service Manager > Calculating the Requested completion date. |