When making the Go/No-Go decision at the end of large projects, “begin with the end in mind” – such useful words.
You can think of it not unlike Test-Driven Development. “Here are all the things that have to be working and lined up in order to say this project is ready to deploy. Let’s build towards that.”
In the end a Decision Matrix is called for, something that should be evolving as the project progresses. Assembling such a document is a large subject.
An important goal should be to minimize subjectivity in the decision. This can be done with pre-planned checklists, scorecards and so on. Full bore testing is, of course, essential.
Building and maintaining support, and visibility, for this process should be done throughout the life of the project.
You especially want to avoid statements like these from different parts of the business trying to take over the decision:
- ‘Go, because we’ve already spent eleventy-billion dollars on this project’
- ‘Go, because I promised the board we’d be live by fiscal year-end’
- ‘Go, because I don’t want to be the one to say No-go’
- ‘No-go, because my department is nervous’
- ‘No-go, because we should have used a different ETL tool’
Be wary of such concerns driving the decision.
In the end, the decision process should be known to all, well in advance.