Instructor: In this lesson, we're going to talk
about step four of the troubleshooting methodology,
which is Establish A Plan Of Action.
Now, CompTIA likes to word this as establish a plan
of action to resolve the problem and implement the solution,
and also refer to the vendor's instructions for guidance.
Now, when we're establishing a plan
of action to resolve the problem,
what we are trying to do is figure out,
how are we going to solve that underlying probable cause
that we identified back
in step two and verified in step three.
At this point, we haven't actually solved the problem,
but we've identified it and we've verified
that that problem exists and we know what the problem is.
So now, we need to establish our plan of action.
For example, if we are dealing with a power problem,
and we've identified that the power supply is bad,
we can then do a couple of different things.
We could repair it, we could replace it,
or we can issue a workaround.
Now, when we repair something,
we need to determine how much
is it going to cost to repair something.
For example, my kid has an iPad
and they actually crack the screen on it.
Now I can fix that screen,
but what I found out was it wasn't worth the repair.
The cost to get a new screen
for that iPad was about 350 to $400,
and that's if I was going to install it myself.
The cost of a brand new iPad was only about 450 to $500
on sale that week.
So, I just decided it
wasn't worth repairing this two year old device,
and so instead, I opted for option number two,
which is to replace the device.
Now, in this case, instead of replacing the screen,
I actually replaced the entire iPad
because it made more fiscal sense to replace
the entire device
and get a new one that's going to last another two
or three years than it was to repair that single component
because other components could then start failing as well.
So this is one
of those judgment calls that you're going to have to make.
And generally in an organization, you're going to get some left
and right guidelines of when it makes sense to repair
versus replace a given component or system in your network.
Another option you have is a workaround.
Now, not all problems you encounter are going to be life
and death critical things that must be solved today
at all costs.
Now, in some cases,
it might be too time consuming to repair something
or too expensive to replace it,
and in those cases it may be better just to do a workaround.
For example, let's say I'm on a business trip
and I have a really expensive laptop with me,
but as I was out there working, I actually dropped it
and the screen cracked, and now I can't work on this laptop.
Now I'm not going to be home
from this business trip for another two or three weeks
and I need to have this machine working right now.
So I have a couple options.
I can actually replace the screen right now by going
in doing an emergency overnight fix that might cost me two
or three times as much money, or I can actually delay
because I know somebody there has the tools technology
and ability to replace that screen
for me at a very low cost.
Now, in the meantime,
I still need to be able to get work done.
So do I want to spend $2,000 to fix this machine right now,
that'll last me in the next two weeks,
Or if I wait two weeks
until I get back to the office, it might only cost me $200.
Well, there's a third option.
I can create a workaround.
And in this case, and I might go
to the local office supply store and buy a $99 monitor
to use for the next two weeks
while I'm working out of my hotel room.
That would work just fine as a workaround,
but not as a long term replacement,
because this is a laptop after all,
and I don't want to have to always carry
around a big monitor with me every place I go.
So in this case, I might buy a hundred dollars monitor,
set it up in my hotel room, use it while I'm there
and then donate it to charity as I leave that city.
I've actually done this several times
not because of a broken monitor,
but because when I'm working in a hotel room
and I'm going to be someplace for three or four or five weeks,
I don't want to have to work off a little 13 inch monitor.
So instead, I might go to the local store and buy a 20, 24,
or 27-inch monitor for about $100 or $150,
use it for the three to five weeks that I'm in that area,
and then donate it to a local charity before I leave.
That way I can use the large screen that I need
for that three to five weeks without having to carry it
onto a plane as I fly all over the place.
And so I've actually done this several times
especially when I'm going to someplace
for a longer period of time.
If I'm only going to be there for a day or two, I'll just
use my smaller laptop monitor.
But if I'm going to be gone for a significant amount of time,
I will buy an extra monitor as a workaround
to give me the larger screen that I need when I'm working.
So keep this in mind.
When you're dealing with a problem,
usually you're going to have three main things you can do
as part of your plan of action.
You can repair it, you can replace it,
or you can create a workaround.
Now, in addition to figuring out what you're going to do,
you also need to plan how it's going to be done,
and this is known as establishing a plan of action.
Now when you devise your plan of action,
you're going to say, how much resources,
how much time, and how much cost
is there going to be associated
with the given solution you're choosing?
Also, if there's any impacts to the other users
or other systems, you need to identify those as well,
and depending on your corporate policies and procedures,
you might need to seek permission to be able to go
through with your plan.
For example, when I was the IT director
for a large organization,
I couldn't just reboot the servers anytime
of the day or night that I felt like it.
I had to go up to the executives and say, hey,
here's my plan for the upgrade we're going to do.
I want to reboot the servers,
we're going to have five minutes
of downtime during that reboot period,
what is a good time for the business
for me to be able to do this?
And they might say, between two and three
in the morning would be a great time to do it
because everyone's asleep.
You don't want to do it in the middle
of the afternoon in prime business hours
when we're trying to use the network.
And so these are things you're going to have to figure
out based on your organization
and how you're going to implement your plan of action.
Another thing to keep in mind is that a lot
of systems work together, and so if you're working
on a single machine such as an end user's machine,
it probably isn't going to be that big
of a deal and you can reboot it without permission.
But if you're working on a server,
like a file server, a print server, or a domain controller,
this can have a massive effect across the organization.
For example, if you're working
on the domain controller and you reboot
that, this can prevent users from being able to log
into their own workstations because the domain
controller isn't available to do that authentication.
On the other hand,
if you're doing something like a file server,
this is actually going to disconnect all the users
from the file server, but they can still print
and they can still log
into the servers because the print server
and domain controller may still be up.
So it's important to understand what is the impact
of your particular solution that you're doing
as part of your plan of action.
Once you have that plan of action
in place and you've got the authority to move ahead,
you can then implement your solution.
This might be installing a new update,
replacing a piece of hardware,
or rebooting the system.
Regardless of what it is,
you need to make sure you stick
with the plan of action you've created
and follow the steps that you've outlined
because that's what everyone is expecting you to do.
If you have a change to that plan,
you're going to need to go back
and get authorization again, because remember,
any changes could implement the larger system
and other things
across the network that you may not be aware of.
So you need to keep that in mind
and make sure you're always working as part
of the larger team when you are establishing your plan
of action and implementing your solution.