Shift Left is an approach which sees solution development, delivery and support pushed to earlier stages in their lifecycle and so gains…

The 'Shift Left' approach focuses on moving support activities closer to the customer and earlier in the service lifecycle. This is achieved through automation, self-service, and empowering front-line staff. Activities like auto-detection of potential issues (proactive prevention), auto-correction, and self-service diagnosis are core features of Shift Left as they resolve or prevent issues at the earliest possible point. Conversely, automatically referring an incident to second-line support is an escalation. This action moves the responsibility further away from the customer and the front line, which is the opposite of the Shift Left principle.

A. Auto-correction of operational issues after they have occurred: This is a feature of Shift Left, as it uses automation to resolve issues instantly without escalating to human support teams.

B. Auto-detection of potential operational issues before they occur: This is a key aspect of Shift Left, moving from reactive support to proactive prevention, which is the earliest possible stage in the incident lifecycle.

D. Self service incident diagnosis: This is a quintessential example of Shift Left, empowering the end-user (Tier 0 support) to diagnose and often resolve their own issues, reducing reliance on the service desk.

1. VeriSM™: A service management approach for the digital age. (2018). Van Haren Publishing.

Section 4.4.1, 'Shift Left': This section defines Shift Left as "the practice of moving work closer to its source." It explicitly provides examples such as moving activities from a service desk to a self-service portal for the consumer. The principle is to resolve issues at the lowest, most efficient level possible. Escalation to a higher tier like second-line support is contrary to this principle.

2. EXIN. (2018). Preparation Guide EXIN VERISME™ Foundation.

Section 3.3, 'Progressive practices': The guide explains that Shift Left aims to handle tickets faster and more cheaply by moving resolution to a lower-cost part of the organization, such as the service desk or directly to the user via self-service. Automating escalation to a more specialized (and expensive) team like second-line support contradicts this core objective of efficiency and cost-saving.