IT Management
Tips for handling an IT crisis Being caught up in an IT disaster can be a palm-sweating, pulse- quickening, sick-to-the-stomach experience, especially if you feel, even in some part, personally responsible. Because of the lack of error transparency in business culture, it can be very difficult to find guidance on how to deal with such a situation. If no one ever comes clean about their own IT crises, then there will never be information out there on how to handle them.
So, how can you best cope when faced with an impending IT project crisis?
Keep calm It’s easier said than done, but the important thing is not to panic. Science shows that we generally make terrible decisions when stressed, meaning that one failure can very easily lead to another and we soon find ourselves in a downward spiral of poor decision- making.
Speak up Flag your awareness of the problem as soon as possible. Don’t keep it to yourself through fear of becoming a shot messenger or believing that blame will be apportioned. While no one in a good IT team should be made to feel they’re alone in causing or trying to solve a problem, you will have something to answer for if you’re aware of a problem and choose not to discuss it.
Share your worries Do you feel you’re that catastrophising and the issue probably isn’t as bad as you fear? Address it anyway. Te chances are that as time goes on, the situation will only worsen if not dealt with. It’s preferable to over prepare than end up with a bigger disaster on your hands.
Crisis plan As soon as an IT crisis has been identified, get to work on producing a crisis plan. You should have a crisis policy in place before anything goes wrong, so you’re ready to act as soon as it does. Your IT crisis policy should outline what to do in times of crisis, depending on the nature and severity of the situation. It should include a chain of command, so you know who is responsible for what actions and who gives final sign off at every stage.
Know your limits You can’t fix every problem yourself. Even if you’re part of a large organisation, it doesn’t mean that the skillset exists in-house to best deal with the problem. Even if the right skills are in abundance, oſten working with an external partner brings much needed objectivity to proceedings. A trusted partner experienced in handling IT crises will allow you to gather perspective and cut through the stress and emotions to pinpoint what needs to happen next.
Report and evaluate When your IT disaster is over, create a report which examines and evaluates how your team handled the situation. What you did well; what you could have done better; what changes you
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would make to handling a crisis next time. Tis analytical approach helps you move forward with best practice and helps prevent a similar issue from happening again.
Be open and honest Once you’re in the recovery stage of your IT crisis and have made valuable findings through your inquiry and reporting process, then consider sharing those findings externally. You don’t have to share everything, but even an overview of what went wrong, how it went wrong and what you did to put things back on course could be extremely helpful for others in the industry to learn from. It’s not just for the benefit of others, though. Proactively releasing
your findings shows that you’re responsible, transparent and, yes, even fallible. Taking charge of when and how your story is released means that you’re in control of the message and the narrative, rather than it being leſt for someone else to get their hands on and angle as they see fit. Trying to conceal a story may not be the best strategy either. It
could result in the Streisand Effect, where efforts to keep the story out of the public domain by downplaying or hiding it, actually have the opposite effect, where interest ends up being heightened.
IT disasters to hit the headlines Sometimes, when the dirt has really hit the fan, IT disaster stories are forced into the public domain. By this point, the disaster has reached devastation point and the fallout has been immense. Te team behind the crisis is leſt embarrassed and even made to feel like a laughing stock for not recognising or addressing the failure sooner. On some occasions, criticism is valid. When teams fail to
comply with legislation or their neglect causes or exacerbates the problem, public or customer outcry is to be expected. On other occasions, a series of unfortunate and unforeseen events may have led to an unavoidable issue, which had far-reaching consequences. One of the worst-known IT disasters to hit the headlines was
when Public Health England used an old file format of Microsoft Excel to record Covid-19 data. As the format could only handle around 65,000 rows of data, many simply fell off, resulting in 16,000 coronavirus cases going unreported. The main problem with big IT disasters, especially when they
go unaddressed, is the effect they can have on people’s lives. In February 2021, whistle blowers from the Arizona Department of Corrections, revealed that some inmates convicted of nonviolent offences were not being made aware of their eligibility for release because of a fault in the software system. What’s more, the whistle blowers, who remained anonymous
through fear of retaliation, said that the CIO and deputy director had been made aware of the issue since 2020. The best way to avoid IT disaster is not to let the issue get to
crisis point in the first place. Careful risk assessment, continuous monitoring and quick reactions can help mitigate disaster escalation. But when you find yourself in the middle of an IT crisis, the most important thing is that you’re prepared with a plan for how best to navigate your way through it and know who you can work with to help you enter repair and recovery mode as soon as possible.
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