Responsibilities for Incident Communication Plan

  • Release version: Zurich
  • Updated July 31, 2025
  • 2 minutes to read
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    Summary of Responsibilities for Incident Communication Plan

    This content explains how ServiceNow customers can manage contact responsibilities within incident communication plans to ensure effective notification and coordination during incidents. It clarifies the roles involved, the default and additional responsibilities, and how these contacts support incident resolution and communication throughout the incident lifecycle.

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    Key Features

    • Contact Responsibilities: Two types are defined for incident communication plans:
      • Default Responsibilities: Contacts notified automatically when an incident communication plan is created.
      • Other Responsibilities: Additional contacts that can be selected for notification as needed.
    • Default Responsibilities: Include three key roles essential for incident management:
      • Duty Manager: The senior on-duty person who assesses incidents, initiates corrective actions, and consults the Incident Manager as needed.
      • Incident Manager: Oversees technical resources, assesses incident severity, and escalates to the Duty Director if necessary.
      • Duty Director: Handles escalation for critical service issues, approves recovery plans, and manages senior-level communications.
    • Other Responsibilities: Additional roles that can be added to plans to enhance communication and resolution efforts, including:
      • Business Director
      • Communication Manager
      • Crisis Action Manager
      • Crisis Action Team Member
      • Development Personnel
      • Operations Support Personnel
      • Service Owner
      • Technical Support
    • Contact Definitions: Rules that determine which users are associated with each responsibility can be viewed and modified, enabling customization of notifications.

    Practical Application for ServiceNow Customers

    ServiceNow customers can use these defined responsibilities to configure incident communication plans that ensure the right stakeholders are automatically or selectively notified during incidents. Understanding these roles helps streamline incident response by clarifying who is accountable for assessment, escalation, technical resolution, and communication. Customers can also create custom contact responsibilities tailored to their organizational needs.

    Next Steps

    • Define or modify contact responsibilities to align with your organizational structure.
    • Create contact definitions to specify users for each responsibility role.
    • Add users as contacts to ensure timely notifications during incident communication plans.
    • Use default roles for immediate notification and add other roles as appropriate for the incident context.

    Contact responsibilities helps you to identify contacts by their responsibilities and to understand what you can expect from the user throughout the life cycle of the communication plan.

    There are two types of responsibilities available for use with incident communication plans:
    • Default Responsibilities: Contacts who are notified by default.
    • Other Responsibilities: Contacts who can be selected for notification.

    Use contact definitions to view and modify the rules that determine the specific users associated with contact responsibilities.

    Default Responsibilities

    By default, contacts with the following responsibilities are notified when an incident communication plan is created:
    • Duty Manager
    • Incident Manager
    • Duty Director

    These roles are involved with resolving the source incident or original event that the incident communication plan relates to. They are seen as key contacts for the incident communication plan.

    The following sections describe typical operational roles for these responsibilities.
    Table 1. Contact Administration Default Responsibilities
    Responsibility Description
    Duty Manager The senior point of presence in the monitoring environment at the time an incident occurs. The Duty Manager assesses the incident against standard operating procedures, escalation triggers, and personal knowledge and experience, to take corrective actions. To clarify the urgency and impact of an incident, the Duty Manager can contact the Incident Manager for advice.
    Incident Manager A senior technician, accountable for coordinating and managing all technical resources required to resolve incidents. After being notified by the Duty Manager of a serious incident, the Incident Manager assesses the seriousness and associated business impact. Based on this assessment, the Incident Manager decides whether to escalate the incident to the Duty Director. The Incident Manager may escalate to the Duty Director to gain access to resources outside of the department, if necessary.
    Duty Director The escalation point for all issues that affect critical services. The Duty Director works in partnership with the business directors in the organization to approve recovery plans developed by the Incident Manager. The Duty Director also manages the senior level communications for the source incident.

    Other Responsibilities

    Incident Communications Management provides the following additional responsibilities that can be added to incident communication plans. You can also create contact responsibilities, as needed. The associated users receive notifications about the incident communication plan.
    Table 2. Contact Administration Other Responsibilities
    Responsibility Description
    Business Director Director within the business who is identified as a potential contact when an incident communication plan occurs.
    Communication Manager Business-facing role in the event communication is required in an incident communication plan.
    Crisis Action Manager Overall responsibility and accountability for managing incident communication plans.
    Crisis Action Team Member Nominated department heads who are involved when an incident communication plan occurs.
    Development personnel Development personnel involved in the troubleshooting and resolving an incident communication plan.
    Operations support personnel Personnel involved in the second or third level of support in troubleshooting and resolving an incident communication plan.
    Service Owner Service owner or manager who is identified as a potential contact when an incident communication plan relates to one or more of their services.
    Technical Support Second or third level technical support personnel involved in troubleshooting and resolving an incident communication plan.