The testing phase results may or may not be favorable, so you should have an iterative process in place that will permit you to go back to a different phase of the process until you find the right solution. This means that, as part of the troubleshooting process, you should know which phase you should go back to. For example, if you performed enough information gathering and you are sure that you have all the facts, you can skip this phase.
The iterative process may also involve the following actions:
- Using an audio recording device throughout the process to capture the actions taken
- Sharing the results with the online community, using work groups and bulletin boards that can help you obtain answers quickly
- Escalation to a Layer 2 or Layer 3 technician
After finding and implementing the solution to the problem reported, most network professionals just move on without taking one important step into consideration: implementing preventative measures, to avoid having the issue occur again in the future. This includes procedures that mitigate the problem, such as building a redundant network topology with failover capabilities to minimize the effect of a device going down.
As a network technician you should be prepared for unexpected risk, as often times things that you do to fix a problem will have unexpected consequences on other users, systems, or applications.