CIM CIM Change Management & Incident Prevention 2 — Questions and Answers
Question 1: What is the primary purpose of a 'back-out plan' in a change management record?
- To schedule future changes after this one completes
- To assign accountability if the change fails
- To document the estimated cost of implementing the change
- To provide step-by-step procedures for reversing the change if it causes problems (Correct answer)
Correct answer: To provide step-by-step procedures for reversing the change if it causes problems
A back-out (rollback) plan documents the steps needed to reverse a change and restore the prior state if the change causes unintended incidents or service failures.
Question 2: Which analysis technique helps determine whether a spike in incidents was caused by recent changes?
- Mean Time Between Failures trend graph review
- Customer satisfaction score decline review
- Change record vs. incident spike correlation analysis (Correct answer)
- Open problem record count review
Correct answer: Change record vs. incident spike correlation analysis
Correlating incident spikes with recent change records helps Incident Managers identify poorly controlled changes as a root cause of service disruptions.
Question 3: What is a 'Change Freeze Period' in ITIL change management?
- A scheduled maintenance window for applying all pending changes at once
- A period during which non-emergency changes are prohibited to protect service stability (Correct answer)
- A mandatory cooldown enforced after every major incident
- A period when the CAB suspends its regular meetings
Correct answer: A period during which non-emergency changes are prohibited to protect service stability
A Change Freeze Period prohibits non-emergency changes during high-risk business periods (e.g., financial year-end) to protect service stability and prevent change-induced incidents.
Question 4: When a recently deployed change causes a service incident, what is the correct immediate response?
- Document the incident and wait for the scheduled Post-Implementation Review
- Continue with the change since it is already deployed to production
- Execute the back-out plan and collaborate with the Incident Manager to restore service (Correct answer)
- Deny any relationship between the change and incident until evidence is formally confirmed
Correct answer: Execute the back-out plan and collaborate with the Incident Manager to restore service
When a change causes an incident, teams must execute the pre-prepared back-out plan and work with the Incident Manager to restore service as quickly as possible.
Question 5: What key input does incident management provide to the change management process?
- SLA performance summaries from the previous quarter
- Customer satisfaction surveys from affected users
- Requests for Change (RFCs) to implement permanent fixes for recurring incident root causes (Correct answer)
- A list of all currently unresolved incidents in the queue
Correct answer: Requests for Change (RFCs) to implement permanent fixes for recurring incident root causes
Incident management feeds into change management through Requests for Change (RFCs) raised to implement permanent fixes for recurring or major incidents identified through problem management.
Question 6: What does high 'change velocity' in an IT environment typically signal to an Incident Manager?
- The CAB is meeting more frequently than its standard schedule
- Changes are being approved faster than industry benchmarks allow
- The CMDB is being updated at an accelerated rate
- A high rate of changes is occurring, which often correlates with increased incident risk (Correct answer)
Correct answer: A high rate of changes is occurring, which often correlates with increased incident risk
High change velocity (many changes implemented in a short period) typically correlates with elevated incident rates, and Incident Managers should treat it as a heightened risk indicator.
CIM CIM Change Management & Incident Prevention 2
What is the primary purpose of a 'back-out plan' in a change management record?