The idea behind an escalation matrix is simple: the situation requires greater authority to resolve. Authority can take many forms, including experience with a particular toolset or simply the proper permissions to flip the right switches. Therefore, escalation must involve putting the proper information into the right person’s hands (well, device).

As IT and DevOps teams rely more heavily on third-party services, the likelihood of an external incident affecting your customers increases. The 2017 Amazon S3 outage comes to mind as a particularly large downtime event that took thousands of websites down with it. When things go wrong with either an internal or external service, the right people need to be alerted to properly respond to the issue and communicate with customers.

The Evolve Leadership and Technology Conference, hosted by our partner Trace3, saw over 1,300 IT execs gathering at Caesar’s Palace for two days of world-class keynotes and insights into the latest trends and technologies of the IT landscape.