# Use the incident overview

Scan the incident's next step, scope, signals, work, timeline, and Diagnosis state.

## Before you start

### Intended audience

Responders who need a fast operational handoff.

### Required permissions

You need permission to view the incident.


### Prerequisites

- Open an incident. Select Overview.

## Procedure

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### Scan the incident

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1. **Read the next step.** For a fast scan, use this order: Next step → scope, impact, and owner → Response signals → Open work → Timeline highlights → Diagnosis. Open Next step when you need full context.

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2. **Review identity and scope.** Review severity, status, affected service, regions, customer impact, ownership, and last update.

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### Review response work

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3. **Review response signals.** Use Response signals to find open questions, evidence, and event counts.

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4. **Review open work.** Review Open work in urgency and due-date order.

![Incident Overview with a specific suggested action, affected scope, evidence, and events.](https://tellagen.com/help/assets/incident-overview-operational-summary-2026-08-29.webp)

Scan the Overview for the next action, affected scope, and the latest operational evidence.

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5. **Review timeline highlights.** Read Timeline highlights. Select View timeline for the complete event record.

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6. **Review Diagnosis.** Review the Diagnosis summary. Open Diagnosis for its evidence and saved result.

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### Resolve missing context

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7. **Fill missing context.** Use Set service, Set regions, or Assess impact when a critical value is missing.

## You are done when…

You can state the incident scope, impact, owner, next action, and latest evidence from one screen.

## Troubleshooting

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### A critical value shows Not set or is blank.

Use the adjacent Set or Assess action. Do not infer missing incident context. The Overview keeps the gap visible until a responder fills it.

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### Open work is empty.

Review the timeline and incident scope directly. Open work only lists response actions that have been added to that panel.

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### A summary needs more detail.

Open the linked workspace for the complete record.

## Related articles

- **Recommended next task:** [Set an incident's scope and ownership](https://tellagen.com/help/update-incident-scope)
- [Record timeline evidence](https://tellagen.com/help/record-timeline-evidence)
- [Manage response actions](https://tellagen.com/help/manage-response-actions)


## Continue through the incident lifecycle

- **Previous task:** [Set an incident's scope and ownership](https://tellagen.com/help/update-incident-scope)
- **Next task:** [Assess customer impact for an incident](https://tellagen.com/help/assess-customer-impact)
- [Back to Support Center](https://tellagen.com/help#help-search)

## Last verified date

2026-08-29