On-callHardoc-p039

Subject Incident responseLevel Senior–Staff~20 minCommon in Reliability & on-call interviewsIndustries Technology

Question

The primary database is unhealthy and automatic failover hasn't triggered. You must decide whether and how to fail over manually. How do you reason about it?

What a strong answer looks like

Stop the bleeding first (mitigate), then form hypotheses from real signals. Separate root cause from symptom, communicate status as you go, and close with what prevents a repeat.

Learn the concepts

Diagram & narrate the incident

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Run or narrate your approach, then ask the coach.