Automatically identifying critical resources of an organization

摘要

A method and associated systems for automatically identifying critical resources in an organization. An organization creates a model of the dependencies between pairs of resource instances, wherein that model describes how the organization's projects and services are affected when a resource instance becomes unavailable. This model may be represented as a system of directed graphs. This model may be used to automatically identify a resource instance as “critical” when excessive cost is required to resume all projects and services rendered infeasible by the disruption of that resource instance. This model may also be used to automatically identify a resource instance as “critical for a resource type” when disruption of the resource instance forces the capacity of the resource type available to the entire organization to fall below a threshold value.

主权项

1. A method for automatically identifying critical resources of an organization, wherein said organization comprises a plurality of resource instances, wherein a resource instance of said plurality of resource instances is associated with a resource type of a plurality of resource types, wherein said organization comprises a plurality of projects, wherein a project of said plurality of projects comprises a demand for a capacity of a resource type of said plurality of resource types, and wherein a disruption of a first resource instance of said plurality of resource instances results in an unavailability of a unit of a second instance of said plurality of resource instances, said method comprising:
a processor of a computer system receiving one or more dependency relationships, wherein a dependency relationship of said one or more dependency relationships relates an independent resource instance of said plurality of resource instances with a dependent resource instance of said plurality of resource instances, and wherein a disruption of said independent resource instance results in an unavailability of a unit of said dependent resource instance; said processor determining a disrupted capacity of a disrupted resource type of said plurality of resource types, wherein said disrupted capacity is a function of an initial disruption of an initially disrupted resource instance of said plurality of resource instances, and wherein said disrupted capacity is a further function of said one or more dependency relationships; said processor categorizing said initially disrupted resource instance as being critical for said disrupted resource type, wherein said categorizing is a function of said disrupted capacity of said disrupted resource type.