Sankofa/docs/runbooks/ESCALATION_PROCEDURES.md

# Escalation Procedures

## Overview

This document defines escalation procedures for incidents, support requests, and operational issues in the Sankofa Phoenix platform.

## Escalation Levels

### Level 1: On-Call Engineer
- **Response Time**: Immediate (P0/P1) or < 1 hour (P2/P3)
- **Responsibilities**:
  - Initial incident triage
  - Basic troubleshooting
  - Service restart/recovery
  - Status updates

### Level 2: Team Lead / Senior Engineer
- **Response Time**: < 15 minutes (P0/P1) or < 2 hours (P2/P3)
- **Responsibilities**:
  - Complex troubleshooting
  - Architecture decisions
  - Code review for hotfixes
  - Customer communication

### Level 3: Engineering Manager
- **Response Time**: < 30 minutes (P0) or < 4 hours (P1)
- **Responsibilities**:
  - Resource allocation
  - Cross-team coordination
  - Business impact assessment
  - Executive communication

### Level 4: CTO / VP Engineering
- **Response Time**: < 1 hour (P0 only)
- **Responsibilities**:
  - Strategic decisions
  - Customer escalation
  - Public communication
  - Resource approval

## Escalation Triggers

### Automatic Escalation
- P0 incident not resolved in 30 minutes
- P1 incident not resolved in 2 hours
- Multiple services affected simultaneously
- Data loss or security breach detected

### Manual Escalation
- On-call engineer requests assistance
- Customer escalates to management
- Issue requires expertise not available at current level
- Business impact exceeds threshold

## Escalation Matrix

| Severity | Level 1 | Level 2 | Level 3 | Level 4 |
|----------|---------|---------|---------|---------|
| P0 | Immediate | 15 min | 30 min | 1 hour |
| P1 | 15 min | 30 min | 2 hours | 4 hours |
| P2 | 1 hour | 2 hours | 24 hours | N/A |
| P3 | 4 hours | 24 hours | 1 week | N/A |

## Escalation Process

### Step 1: Initial Assessment
1. On-call engineer receives alert/notification
2. Assess severity and impact
3. Begin investigation
4. Document findings

### Step 2: Escalation Decision
**Escalate if**:
- Issue not resolved within SLA
- Additional expertise needed
- Customer impact is severe
- Business impact is high
- Security concern

**Do NOT escalate if**:
- Issue is being actively worked on
- Resolution is in progress
- Impact is minimal
- Standard procedure can resolve

### Step 3: Escalation Execution
1. **Notify next level**:
   - Create escalation ticket
   - Update incident channel
   - Call/Slack next level contact
   - Provide context and current status

2. **Handoff information**:
   - Incident summary
   - Current status
   - Actions taken
   - Relevant logs/metrics
   - Customer impact

3. **Update tracking**:
   - Update incident system
   - Update status page
   - Document escalation reason

### Step 4: Escalation Resolution
1. Escalated engineer takes ownership
2. On-call engineer provides support
3. Regular status updates
4. Resolution and post-mortem

## Communication Channels

### Internal Communication
- **Slack/Teams**: `#incident-YYYY-MM-DD-<name>`
- **PagerDuty/Opsgenie**: Automatic escalation
- **Email**: For non-urgent escalations
- **Phone**: For P0 incidents

### External Communication
- **Status Page**: Public updates
- **Customer Notifications**: For affected customers
- **Support Tickets**: Update existing tickets

## Contact Information

### On-Call Rotation
- **Primary**: [Contact Info]
- **Secondary**: [Contact Info]
- **Schedule**: [Link to schedule]

### Escalation Contacts
- **Team Lead**: [Contact Info]
- **Engineering Manager**: [Contact Info]
- **CTO**: [Contact Info]
- **VP Engineering**: [Contact Info]

### Support Contacts
- **Support Team Lead**: [Contact Info]
- **Customer Success**: [Contact Info]

## Escalation Scenarios

### Scenario 1: P0 Service Outage
1. **Detection**: Monitoring alert
2. **Level 1**: On-call engineer investigates (5 min)
3. **Escalation**: If not resolved in 15 min → Level 2
4. **Level 2**: Team lead coordinates (15 min)
5. **Escalation**: If not resolved in 30 min → Level 3
6. **Level 3**: Engineering manager allocates resources
7. **Resolution**: Service restored
8. **Post-Mortem**: Within 24 hours

### Scenario 2: Security Breach
1. **Detection**: Security alert or anomaly
2. **Immediate**: Escalate to Level 3 (bypass Level 1/2)
3. **Level 3**: Engineering manager + Security team
4. **Escalation**: If data breach → Level 4
5. **Level 4**: CTO + Legal + PR
6. **Resolution**: Contain, investigate, remediate
7. **Post-Mortem**: Within 48 hours

### Scenario 3: Data Loss
1. **Detection**: Backup failure or data corruption
2. **Immediate**: Escalate to Level 2
3. **Level 2**: Team lead + Database team
4. **Escalation**: If cannot recover → Level 3
5. **Level 3**: Engineering manager + Customer Success
6. **Resolution**: Restore from backup or data recovery
7. **Post-Mortem**: Within 24 hours

### Scenario 4: Performance Degradation
1. **Detection**: Performance metrics exceed thresholds
2. **Level 1**: On-call engineer investigates (1 hour)
3. **Escalation**: If not resolved → Level 2
4. **Level 2**: Team lead + Performance team
5. **Resolution**: Optimize or scale resources
6. **Post-Mortem**: If P1/P0, within 48 hours

## Customer Escalation

### Customer Escalation Process
1. **Support receives** customer escalation
2. **Assess severity**:
   - Technical issue → Engineering
   - Billing issue → Finance
   - Account issue → Customer Success
3. **Notify appropriate team**
4. **Provide customer updates** every 2 hours (P0/P1)
5. **Resolve and follow up**

### Customer Escalation Contacts
- **Support Escalation**: support-escalation@sankofa.nexus
- **Technical Escalation**: tech-escalation@sankofa.nexus
- **Executive Escalation**: executive-escalation@sankofa.nexus

## Escalation Metrics

### Tracking
- **Escalation Rate**: % of incidents escalated
- **Escalation Time**: Time to escalate
- **Resolution Time**: Time to resolve after escalation
- **Customer Satisfaction**: Post-incident surveys

### Goals
- **P0 Escalation**: < 5% of P0 incidents
- **P1 Escalation**: < 10% of P1 incidents
- **Escalation Time**: < SLA threshold
- **Resolution Time**: < 2x normal resolution time

## Best Practices

### Do's
- ✅ Escalate early if unsure
- ✅ Provide complete context
- ✅ Document all actions
- ✅ Communicate frequently
- ✅ Learn from escalations

### Don'ts
- ❌ Escalate without trying
- ❌ Escalate without context
- ❌ Skip levels unnecessarily
- ❌ Ignore customer escalations
- ❌ Forget to update status

## Review and Improvement

### Monthly Review
- Review escalation patterns
- Identify common causes
- Update procedures
- Train team on improvements

### Quarterly Review
- Analyze escalation metrics
- Update contact information
- Review and update SLAs
- Improve documentation