How do you prioritize and categorize technical issues when troubleshooting?

Identify the problem.?Establish a theory of probable cause.?Test the theory to determine the cause.?Establish a plan of action to resolve the problem and implement the solution. Excellent listening skill, research skill and technical know how skill goes a long way. Adapt and thrive .

Networking is complex and changes all the time. Diagnosing a networking problem requires many kinds of knowledge, precise attention to detail, and excellent problem solving skills. Once you know where to look and what to look for, it’s easy to complete a differential diagnosis of the issue. You just have to make sure to start small and follow a clear path.

A key point here is "how long will it take to fix?" This then feeds into the priority decision-making matrix. As a general rule (we can all think of exceptions) when faced with several tasks of similar urgency, it's best to start with the shortest. Worked example - I have five issues to address. One will take one minute, another five minutes, the third half a day, the fourth a whole day, the fifth a week. All the customers are chasing for their solutions and we all know that customers chasing slows work down. If I begin with the shortest, after one day of work I will only have two customers chasing me, after two days, only one. If I go to the other extreme and start with the longest, I will have all five customers chasing for a whole week!

Once you've defined and prioritized your problem domain, the next step is to start digging in and finding the root cause of the issue. You can do this in any number of ways, but the main thing to remember is that you must test, analyze, adapt and repeat this until you've located the culprit and found a viable solution to the issue. I generally start by recreating the error on my own. Once I've seen the error happening myself, I can then backtrack and use the process of elimination to logically rule out potential causes until I've found the culprit. You should also verify your expectations each step of the way to ensure you remain focused and don't lose site of the original problem.

Technical documentation makes your organization’s knowledge more documented and accessible. The purpose of technical documentation is to make life simpler for every stakeholder by empowering them with simple, clear, easily accessible information.