Problem Management in Service Operations Workspace

  • Release version: Xanadu
  • Updated August 1, 2024
  • 2 minutes to read
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    Summary of Problem Management in Service Operations Workspace

    Problem Management in Service Operations Workspace enables you to identify the root cause of recurring or major incidents and implement permanent fixes to prevent recurrence. It supports managing problems throughout their lifecycle, sharing workarounds or fixes with related incidents, and creating known error articles to reduce incident volume.

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    The Problem record interface includes several tabs for comprehensive problem handling:

    Key Features

    • Overview Tab: Displays summary, analysis, resolution details, problem and fix tasks, impact, and work notes. This tab is configurable via the Service Operations Workspace Admin Center.
    • Details Tab: Shows detailed problem information and allows adding work notes. All problem form fields from the ServiceNow AI Platform are available, except the State field, which is read-only here.
    • Problem Tasks Tab: Lists tasks assigned to other teams to identify fixes for the problem.
    • Fix Tasks Tab: Displays fix tasks, which in this workspace are configured as change requests.
    • Related Records Tab: Provides access to related incidents, affected configuration items (CIs), outages, and knowledge articles. You can add, create, or remove related records as needed.
    • Contextual Side Panel: Access Agent Assist to search and perform actions on relevant records directly from the problem record.
    • Shortcuts: Optional quick actions to create defects, enhancements, or improvement initiatives to support problem resolution and continual improvement.

    Practical Use

    ServiceNow customers can create and manage problems to investigate incident root causes, coordinate cross-team efforts through problem tasks, and track fixes via change requests. The workspace facilitates knowledge sharing and incident deflection by linking workarounds and known error articles.

    Configuration and Customization

    The Problem Management interface and fields can be tailored to organizational needs using the Service Operations Workspace Admin Center and configuration options for ITSM processes.

    Related Capabilities

    This Problem Management functionality integrates with other Service Operations Workspace modules, including Change Management, Incident Management, Knowledge Management, and Continual Improvement Management, enabling a comprehensive IT service management experience.

    Next Steps for Customers

    • Create problems to investigate recurring or major incidents.
    • Assign and manage problem tasks to collaborate with different teams.
    • Use fix tasks (change requests) to track resolutions.
    • Leverage the related records tab and Agent Assist to connect incidents and knowledge articles.
    • Configure the workspace to align with specific organizational workflows.

    When you have recurring incidents or a major incident, you can create a problem to identify the root cause of the incidents and help prevent them from happening again. Use Service Operations Workspace to manage problems through their life cycle, share workarounds or fixes with related incidents, and create known error articles to help deflect incidents.

    Figure 1. Problem record in Service Operations Workspace
    Problem record in Service Operations Workspace

    Overview tab

    This tab displays the following information about a problem:
    • Summary
    • Analysis information
    • Resolution information
    • Problem tasks and fix tasks
    • Impact
    • Work notes

    You can configure the problem record overview tab and its UI elements in the Service Operations Workspace Admin Center. For more information, see Manage configurations in Service Operations Workspace for ITSM.

    You can optionally enable the following shortcuts, accessible from both the header and Tasks (problem and fix) drop-down menus:

    For all other configuration options, see Configuring Problem Management in Service Operations Workspace.

    Details tab

    This section displays the detailed information of a problem. For information about fields in this section, see Create a problem in Service Operations Workspace.

    From the Compose section, you can add work notes for the problem.

    All fields that are available on the Problem form in ServiceNow AI Platform are available in Service Operations Workspace. However, on the problem form in Service Operations Workspace, the State field is read-only. For information about state transitions of a problem, see Life cycle of a problem.

    For information on how you can configure fields in this tab, see Configuring Problem Management in Service Operations Workspace.

    Problem Tasks tab

    This section displays problems tasks associated with this problem. Problem tasks are created when you need help from other teams to identify a fix for the problem. For information about creating a problem task, see Create a problem task in Service Operations Workspace.

    Fix Tasks tab

    This section displays fix tasks associated with the problem. In Service Operations Workspace, only change requests are configured as fix tasks. For information about the List of related task records (comma-separated) to track as fixes for this Problem property where the fix tasks are configured, see Configure properties for Problem Management in Service Operations Workspace.

    Related records tab

    This section displays the following records related to the problem. You can add a record, create a record, or remove it from the problem.
    • Incidents
    • Affected CIs
    • Outages
    • Knowledge attached from Agent Assist

    Contextual side panel

    From this section, you can access Agent assist and search for relevant records and perform the required actions.

    For more information about Problem Management, see Problem Management.