Example 1: The value of Major Incident Management for large organisations
Take a major retailer as an example.
Many large, well-known retailers rely heavily on self-service point-of-sale devices and payment terminals to take payment for goods. During busy trading periods, they may process around £4,000 of transactions per second.
That equates to:
£240,000 per minute
£14,400,000 per hour
That is a substantial loss of earnings for every hour that point-of-sale devices and payment terminals are unavailable.
But the impact of a Major Incident is rarely limited to lost sales.
When clients or consumers become frustrated, the situation can quickly escalate into negative press coverage, social media criticism and wider reputational damage. The
organisation may also experience longer-term commercial consequences if valued
clients lose confidence and decide to take their business elsewhere.
A one-hour outage can create significant impact across multiple areas, including:
- Productivity loss: colleagues are unable to do their jobs effectively
- Financial loss: direct revenue loss, potentially reaching millions per hour
- Reputational damage: immediate frustration from clients, consumers, shareholders and the wider market
- Regulatory exposure: potential failure to maintain required standards, records or service obligations
This is why Major Incident Management is not simply an IT process. It is a business-critical capability.
Example 2: The value of Major Incident Management for smaller organisations
The value of Major Incident Management is just as important for smaller organisations.
Consider a professional services organisation with three office locations across Europe.
The business experiences a complete loss of network access. As a result, 1,000 employees across the three locations are unable to log in, access systems, communicate effectively or progress client work.
If each employee costs the business around £145 per day, the direct productivity cost of a full-day outage is approximately £145,000.
Again, this only reflects the most visible cost.
The wider impact could include missed project deadlines, delayed client deliverables, reduced confidence from partners and suppliers, and increased pressure on internal teams trying to manage the disruption.
For smaller organisations, the financial loss may not reach the same figures as a major retailer, but the relative impact can be just as serious. A prolonged outage can affectcashflow, client relationships, service delivery and the organisation’s ability to operate with confidence.
Major Incidents affect every sector
These examples clearly demonstrate the impact a Major Incident can have on any organisation, regardless of size, sector or maturity.
The list of examples is endless because almost every industry now relies on technology to operate. Retail, financial services, healthcare, professional services, logistics, education, government and technology-led organisations all depend on critical IT services to deliver value.
When those services fail, the impact is immediate.
Mature organisations often take a proactive approach by clearly identifying which IT-enabled business services are critical. They also define what constitutes a Major Incident for their organisation, so teams can respond quickly, consistently and with the right level of urgency.
Why Major Incident Management creates value
Effective Major Incident Management gives organisations the structure, skills and confidence to respond when pressure is at its highest.
It helps teams:
- identify Major Incidents quickly
- establish clear ownership and leadership
- coordinate technical and business response activity
- communicate with stakeholders consistently
- reduce downtime and business disruption
- protect reputation and client confidence
- learn from incidents and improve future resilience
The true value of Major Incident Management is not just in resolving the incident. It is in reducing the impact while the incident is happening.
That requires trained Major Incident Managers who can lead under pressure, bring structure to uncertainty and keep the organisation focused on the right priorities.
Every organisation will experience disruption at some point. The difference is how prepared they are when it happens.
Major Incident Management is a business-critical capability
Major Incident Management gives organisations the ability to move quickly, communicate clearly and make effective decisions when the cost of delay is high.
Whether an outage costs £14 million an hour or £145,000 a day, the principle remains the same: downtime is expensive, disruption damages confidence, and poor coordination makes both worse.
Organisations that invest in Major Incident Management are not just improving an IT process. They are strengthening business resilience, protecting reputation and creating a more confident, capable response to critical disruption.
