Issue Triage

Issue triage assesses incoming design system issues to determine severity, priority, and appropriate routing. Effective issue triage ensures that issues receive attention proportional to their importance while enabling efficient resource allocation.

What Is Issue Triage

Issue triage is the process of evaluating reported issues to determine their severity, assign priority, and route them appropriately. Triage transforms an undifferentiated stream of reports into organized work items that teams can address systematically.

Triage serves multiple purposes. It ensures urgent issues receive immediate attention. It prevents low-priority issues from consuming disproportionate resources. It provides data for planning and resource allocation. It also communicates back to reporters about how their issues will be handled.

How Issue Triage Works

Initial assessment evaluates reported issues against severity criteria. Triage determines whether issues are bugs or feature requests, their scope of impact, and their urgency. This assessment requires understanding both the technical details and the business context.

Severity assignment categorizes issues by impact. Critical severity indicates production-blocking issues. High severity indicates significant impact with available workarounds. Medium severity indicates moderate impact. Low severity indicates minor issues or enhancement requests. Consistent severity definitions enable appropriate response.

Priority assignment determines handling order within severity levels. Multiple factors influence priority including consumer importance, issue age, and strategic alignment. Priority may differ from severity when business factors warrant different handling.

Routing directs issues to appropriate owners or queues. Component owners receive issues related to their components. Specialists receive issues requiring specific expertise. General queues hold issues awaiting assignment or further investigation.

Key Considerations

• Triage criteria should be documented and consistently applied
• Triage volume requires adequate staffing to prevent backlog
• Triage decisions should be communicated to reporters
• Triage metrics reveal patterns worth addressing
• Triage processes should be reviewed for effectiveness

Common Questions

Who should perform issue triage?

Effective triage requires knowledge of the design system, understanding of severity criteria, and judgment about priority. Triage is often performed by senior team members, rotating triage duty, or dedicated triage roles. The right approach depends on issue volume and team structure.

How quickly should issues be triaged?

Issues should be triaged quickly enough that urgent matters receive prompt attention. Many organizations target same-day or next-day triage for new issues. Very high-volume systems may have shorter targets for initial assessment. Backlogged triage delays response to critical issues and frustrates reporters.

How does triage communicate with reporters?

Good triage processes acknowledge reports, communicate severity and priority assignments, and set expectations for next steps. Even if resolution will take time, reporters should know their issue was received and assessed. Automated notifications can handle acknowledgment while human follow-up addresses complex cases.

Summary

Issue triage evaluates reported issues to determine severity, priority, and routing. Success requires clear criteria, adequate staffing, and consistent communication with reporters. Organizations should invest in triage processes that ensure appropriate attention for issues of different importance levels.