Establish Moratoriums

Merriam-Webster defines moratorium as :

1 b: a waiting period set by an authority
2: a suspension of activity

Moratoriums should be incorporated into your operations practices as a way of avoiding the small change that turns into a major outage because the people with the knowledge and skills required to fix the issue are not available. The following are some examples of moratoriums – your business and customers may require a different set of times.

Daily

Establish acceptable times for different kinds of changes – and the times when no change is acceptable during each day. For instance, minor changes that do not require a service outage are allowed between 0700 and 1700. Changes needing a service outage (machine bounce, for instance) are allowed between 0400 and 0700. All other times are a daily moratorium (1700 through 0400) and no production changes are allowed.

Weekly

Is is acceptable to make changes while everyone is gone for the weekend? Or is that the only time you may make changes? Make your moratorium from 1700 Friday to 0400 Monday (weekend moratorium) or 0400 Monday to 1700 Friday (weekday moratorium) as required.

Holiday / Special times

Each business will have a set of special times of the year when changes should be avoided. Holidays, important meetings, particularly busy times, should all be avoided.

Remember to publish your policy and communicate it to everyone involved – SAs, business groups, and customers alike. Also, moratorium does not mean “vacation” – there is always plenty of work to do that will not impact production.