Skip to main content

Post-Mortem

Post-Mortem

Project: {{PROJECT_NAME}} Version: {{VERSION}} Date: {{DATE}} Author: {{AUTHOR}} Status: Draft | In Review | Approved Reviewers: {{REVIEWERS}}

Document History

Version Date Author Changes
0.1 {{DATE}} {{AUTHOR}} Initial draft

Blameless Culture Statement

This post-mortem is conducted in a blameless spirit. Our goal is to understand how and why the incident occurred — not to assign fault to individuals. People make the best decisions they can with the information and tools available at the time. When things go wrong, we look for systemic improvements that make the right action easier and the wrong action harder for everyone.

1. Incident Reference & Metadata

Field Value
Incident ID INC-{{YYYY}}-{{SEQ}}
Severity P{{SEVERITY}}
Incident Report INC-{{YYYY}}-{{SEQ}}
Post-Mortem Facilitator {{FACILITATOR}}
Post-Mortem Date {{PM_DATE}}
Attendees {{ATTENDEES}}
Status Draft / In Review / Final

2. Executive Summary

{{EXECUTIVE_SUMMARY}}

Example: "A database index was dropped during a migration on {{DATE}}, causing query performance to degrade by 50× under load. This resulted in a 1h 23min degraded service period affecting {{USERS}} users. We have restored the index, added migration validation tooling, and created safeguards to prevent similar incidents."

3. Impact Summary

Metric Value
Total duration {{DURATION}} (detected at {{DETECTED}}, resolved at {{RESOLVED}})
Users affected {{USER_COUNT}} ({{USER_PERCENT}}% of user base)
Requests affected {{REQUEST_COUNT}} ({{REQUEST_PERCENT}}% error rate during incident)
Estimated revenue impact ${{REVENUE}}
SLA breach {{SLA_BREACH}}
SLA credits owed ${{CREDITS}}

4. Detailed Timeline

timeline
    title Incident Timeline
    {{TIME_1}} : {{EVENT_1}}
    {{TIME_2}} : {{EVENT_2}}
    {{TIME_3}} : {{EVENT_3}}
    {{TIME_4}} : {{EVENT_4}}
    {{TIME_5}} : {{EVENT_5}}
Time Event MTTD/MTTR Marker
{{T1}} {{EVENT}} ← Incident start
{{T2}} {{EVENT}}
{{T3}} {{EVENT}} ← Detection (MTTD = T3 - T1)
{{T4}} {{EVENT}}
{{T5}} {{EVENT}}
{{T6}} {{EVENT}}
{{T7}} {{EVENT}}
{{T8}} {{EVENT}} ← Resolved (MTTR = T8 - T1)

MTTD (Mean Time to Detect): {{MTTD}} minutes MTTR (Mean Time to Resolve): {{MTTR}} minutes

5. Root Cause Analysis

5.1 5 Whys Analysis

Why # Question Answer
Why 1 Why did users experience {{SYMPTOM}}? {{WHY_1}}
Why 2 Why did {{WHY_1_ANSWER}} happen? {{WHY_2}}
Why 3 Why did {{WHY_2_ANSWER}} happen? {{WHY_3}}
Why 4 Why did {{WHY_3_ANSWER}} happen? {{WHY_4}}
Why 5 Why did {{WHY_4_ANSWER}} happen? {{WHY_5}}

Root cause: {{ROOT_CAUSE}}

5.2 Contributing Factors

Factor Type Action Required
{{FACTOR_1}} Technical / Process / Human Yes / No
{{FACTOR_2}} Technical / Process / Human Yes / No
{{FACTOR_3}} Technical / Process / Human Yes / No

5.3 Trigger Event

The specific trigger for this incident: {{TRIGGER}}

6. What Went Well

  1. {{CATEGORY_1}}: {{DESCRIPTION}}
  2. {{CATEGORY_2}}: {{DESCRIPTION}}
  3. {{CATEGORY_3}}: {{DESCRIPTION}}

7. What Went Wrong

  1. {{CATEGORY_1}}: {{DESCRIPTION}}
  2. {{CATEGORY_2}}: {{DESCRIPTION}}
  3. {{CATEGORY_3}}: {{DESCRIPTION}}

8. Where We Got Lucky

  1. {{LUCKY_1}}
  2. {{LUCKY_2}}
  3. {{LUCKY_3}}

9. Action Items

Short-Term Fixes (This Sprint)

# Action Owner Due Priority Ticket
1 {{SHORT_TERM_1}} {{OWNER}} {{DATE}} Critical {{TICKET}}
2 {{SHORT_TERM_2}} {{OWNER}} {{DATE}} High {{TICKET}}
3 {{SHORT_TERM_3}} {{OWNER}} {{DATE}} Medium {{TICKET}}

Long-Term Improvements (Next Quarter)

# Action Owner Due Priority Ticket
1 {{LONG_TERM_1}} {{OWNER}} {{DATE}} High {{TICKET}}
2 {{LONG_TERM_2}} {{OWNER}} {{DATE}} Medium {{TICKET}}

Process Changes

# Change Owner Implementation Date
1 {{PROCESS_1}} {{OWNER}} {{DATE}}
2 {{PROCESS_2}} {{OWNER}} {{DATE}}

10. Follow-Up Tracking

Follow-up review date: {{FOLLOWUP_DATE}} (4 weeks after incident) Follow-up owner: {{FOLLOWUP_OWNER}}

Action Item Expected Completion Verified Complete Effective
{{ACTION_1}} {{DATE}} Yes / No Yes / No / TBD
{{ACTION_2}} {{DATE}}

11. Recurrence Prevention

Before this incident: {{BEFORE_STATE}}

After implementing action items: {{AFTER_STATE}}

Confidence in prevention: {{CONFIDENCE}} / 10 Residual risk: {{RESIDUAL_RISK}}

12. Review & Sign-Off

Post-mortem presented at: {{MEETING}} on {{MEETING_DATE}} Meeting recording: {{RECORDING_LINK}} Meeting notes: {{NOTES_LINK}}

Approval

Role Name Date Signature
Author
Reviewer
Approver
Back to top