Major Incident workbench — the Post Incident Report tab

  • Release version: Zurich
  • Updated July 31, 2025
  • 2 minutes to read
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    Summary of Major Incident workbench — the Post Incident Report tab

    The Post Incident Report tab in the Major Incident workbench enables major incident managers to thoroughly document and analyze major incidents. This tab helps teams understand the root cause, document resolution actions, and evaluate the incident response process for follow-up improvements. Editing the report is permitted when the incident is in the Resolved state.

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    Key Features

    • Report Sections:
      • Overview: Summarizes the major incident.
      • Findings: Details causes and lessons learned.
      • Resolution: Describes the steps taken to resolve the incident.
      • Timeline: Displays all related activities including communication plans and tasks, which can be refreshed via the Regenerate Timeline button.
    • Problem and Change Management Integration: Managers can add or manage related Problem or Change records directly from the report.
    • Continual Improvement Management (CIM) Integration: When the CIM plugin is activated, related improvement records are included in the report.
    • Report Export: The entire report can be compiled and downloaded as a PDF for sharing or documentation purposes.
    • Incident Form Links:
      • Regenerate PIR Timeline: Available in Resolved state for users with the majorincidentmanager role.
      • Preview PIR: Available in Resolved or Closed state for users with the itil role.
    • Incident Response Timeline Calculation: The "Time to Identify" metric calculates the duration from the earliest alert or incident creation to the time the incident is proposed or directly created as a major incident.

    Practical Benefits for ServiceNow Customers

    This feature streamlines post-incident analysis by consolidating key information into a structured report, supporting continuous improvement and compliance needs. It allows major incident managers to efficiently document findings, resolution efforts, and timelines, enabling better communication across teams and stakeholders. Integration with Problem, Change, and CIM modules enhances traceability and improvement tracking. The ability to export reports as PDFs facilitates formal reporting and audit readiness.

    The Post Incident Report tab helps you to understand the cause of the major incident, and the actions taken by the teams to resolve the incident.

    The teams can assess the incident response and resolution process and determine follow-up action items. The post incident report is required to record the actions performed, the reasons for doing them, and findings.
    Note:
    The major incident manager can edit a report when the incident is in the Resolved state.
    Figure 1. View of the Post Incident Report tab
    Post incident report tab
    The post incident report includes the following sections where a major incident manager can provide required information:
    • Overview: Summary of the incident.
    • Findings: Information on what caused the major incident and any lessons learned in the process.
    • Resolution: Information on the resolution steps taken to resolve the issue. The major incident manager can also add or edit any related Problem or Change information by clicking Add or Manage respectively.
    • Timeline: Information of all the activity feeds, not only of the incident but also of the incident communication plan and incident communication tasks related to the incident. You can update the timeline with the latest activity by clicking Regenerate Timeline.
      Note:
      The information that you provide for Overview, Findings, and Timeline gets updated in the Post Incident Report section on the Incident form.

    If you activate the Continual Improvement Management (CIM) plugin (com.sn_cim), the Related Improvement Records section is displayed in the report. This section displays the Inbound CIM Integrations records.

    When you click View Complete Report, all the information entered by the major incident manager is compiled together and you can download the report in the .PDF format by clicking Download Report PDF.

    The following links appear in the Incident form under the Related Links section:
    • Regenerate PIR Timeline: This link appears when incident is in the Resolved state and the user has the major_incident_manager role.
    • Preview PIR: This link appears when incident is in the Resolved or Closed state and the user has the itil role.
    Note:
    On the downloaded report, under Incident Response Timeline, the time displayed in the timing type Time to Identify is calculated in the following ways:
    • If you propose the incident as a major incident: The time indicates the time from creation of the first related alert for this incident or creation of the incident (in case there is no alert or the Event Management plugin is inactive), whichever occurs first, until the time the incident is first proposed as a major incident.
    • If you create a major incident directly: The time indicates the time from creation of the first related alert for this incident or creation of the incident (in case there is no alert or the Event Management plugin is inactive), whichever occurs first, until the time the incident is promoted as a major incident.