Start with impact
Impact asks how much of the business or service is affected. One user with a workaround is different from an outage affecting every branch. Useful impact criteria can include number of users, critical process affected, revenue exposure, safety, regulatory risk, and customer reach.
Then measure urgency
Urgency asks how quickly action is required before the impact becomes materially worse. A problem with a safe workaround may be important but less urgent. A small issue tied to a hard deadline can be highly urgent even if current impact is limited.
Combine the two
A simple matrix can map high impact plus high urgency to the highest priority, while low impact plus low urgency becomes a lower priority. The exact labels matter less than consistent definitions and examples that people can apply under pressure.
The loudest request is not automatically the highest priority.Working principle
Key idea
Allow priority overrides, but require a reason. Exceptions are normal; invisible exceptions destroy trust in the model.