The Holiday Season Is Over... Incidents Season Is Back!

Have you ever noticed how everything feels calm during the holidays? There are fewer alerts, notifications, and late-night calls. But as soon as January arrives, everything seems chaotic again. This isn't just a feeling—our data backs it up.

The Holiday Calm: What's Going On?

Look at the arrows on the chart showing holiday seasons over the years. You'll notice a clear dip in activity. This calm period happens for a few reasons:

• Less Traffic: With people celebrating and traveling, fewer users access your systems, resulting in fewer issues.
• Deployment Pauses: Many teams choose a "code freeze" during the holidays to avoid significant changes. Fewer changes mean fewer surprises.
• Reduced Human Error: With fewer staff available, the risk of someone launching a buggy build or making disruptive changes decreases.

In short, the holidays let our systems catch a break. But don't get too comfortable; that calm has a hidden downside.

The January Spike: Why Everything Blows Up

Once the new year starts, life—and traffic—returns to normal, or often higher than usual:

• Backlogged Changes: Any updates postponed in December must be deployed. When multiple releases happen at once, incidents can spike dramatically.
• User Influx: Everyone returns to work, bringing a surge of customers and new projects. If your system isn't ready, it can quickly become overwhelmed.

It's a perfect storm: returning user demand collides with newly deployed code while the team is just getting back into the groove.

How to Get Back on Track

No one likes scrambling to resolve issues right after the holidays. Here are some simple strategies to prepare:

• Stagger Your Releases: Instead of launching everything on the first day back, spread out new features and improvements over the first few weeks.
• Review Monitoring and Alerts: Ensure your alerts are active and directed to the right people.
• Plan for Coverage: Set the on-call schedule before the team logs off in December.
• Conduct a System Audit: Analyze last year's logs and performance metrics to identify patterns or potential bottlenecks.

A little planning can help prevent the January spike from derailing your New Year's resolutions.

Quick Note on IsDown

Need help monitoring your systems and third-party services? Consider IsDown. It centralizes real-time status updates and alerts so you won't be caught off guard by an outage. IsDown notifies you about issues as soon as they arise, saving you from sifting through multiple status pages or Slack channels.

Conclusion

While the holidays feel like a magical break, they also set the stage for rising incidents in January. By understanding the data, you can plan, reduce stress, and keep your team focused on what truly matters. Enjoy the holidays, recharge, and be ready to tackle the challenges that come with the new year.

Have a great year, everyone!