Many times, Project Closure is overlooked during the project. To many, successful project delivery is defined by the completion of deliverables as per the objectives of time and cost. Many practitioners consider the process of project closing as an overburden, a process that has minimal significance and scope, and also believe it is only done to satisfy organizational requirements. But, many practitioners don’t realize that the “Closing a Project” Process is as impactful and significant as the initiation, planning, execution, and monitoring, and controlling processes. The process of project closing can be extensively crucial to both the project and the organization. How? Well, failing to conduct thorough project closeout could lead to the following possibilities:
- Put the organization at a considerable amount of risk
- Prevent the organization from realizing the anticipated benefits from the deliverables of the project
- It will result in significant losses to the organization
- It will undermine the project manager and project management team’s credibility
What Does Closing a Project Mean?
“The processes that are performed to conclude all activities across all Project Management process groups to formally complete the project, phase, or contractual obligations is called Project Closing Process. Upon completion, this process group verifies that the defined processes are completed within all of the process groups to close the project, as appropriate, and formally establishes that the project or phase is complete”.
Project Closing is the combination of the following aspects when applied to a project:
- Assuring that all the work has been completed,
- Ensuring that all agreed project management processes have been executed,
- Formally recognizing that the project is completed – upon everyone’s approval.
The features mentioned above are regarded as natural aspects that determine the closing of a project.
Following are situations that demonstrate how the already mentioned features might be overlooked across various projects and also outlines the impacts that result when they are ignored.
Importance of Project Closing Process
If a project is not closed correctly, the project management team along with their efforts, time, and credibility may be negatively perceived for matters that are not their fault or responsibility. Hence, just as Initiation, Planning, Execution, Monitoring, and Controlling processes, Project closing serves an essential purpose for the organization and helps it avoid unfavorable and adverse scenarios.
Below mentioned are examples of scenarios and the impact that they have on the organization when proper project closing is not executed.
Project Closing Process
A comprehensive project closing process would typically include all of the following procedures:
- Ensuring that the project deliverables are entirely accomplished.
- Receiving approvals from the client for the work completed.
- Reviewing, and assessing all organizational governance and project management processes have been applied and executed.
- The official closing of all procurements, reviewing that all work on the contract has been completed and that both the parties have completed their contractual obligations toward each other.
- Formally recognizing the completion of a project and its transition to operations.
- Validating whether the project has achieved all the benefits identified in the business case.
- Capturing of lessons learned: What was done well, and should be documented so it can be repeated in the future? What could have been done better? And if so, how can it have been done better?
- Disbanding project resources, freeing them to perform other projects and undertake other tasks as required by the organization.
- Transitioning project deliverables to the customer organization in a manner that warrants seamless operations and support.
Process ITTOs for “Closing a Project”
| Inputs | Tools & Techniques | Outputs |
| Project Charter: A project Charter refers to a statement of objectives in a project. This statement also sets out detailed project goals, roles, and responsibilities to identify the primary stakeholders and the level of authority of a project manager. | Expert Judgement: Expert judgment is necessary and applied whenever the project manager is performing administrative closure activities. The expert judgment will ensure that the project or phase closure is implemented to meet the appropriate standards. | Project Document Updates: As the project approaches the completion stage, all project documents will be updated and marked as final versions. The lessons learned register is the most important aspect which is finalized to include the final details of project closure. The lesson learned register contains information about benefits management, the accuracy of the business case, project and development lifecycle, issue and risk management, stakeholder engagement, and other project management processes. |
| Project Management Plan: The Project Management Plan documents the project lifecycle and inculcates information on how to close out a project. Remember, every stage has particular deliverables/outcomes which need to be completed and accepted before it can be considered closed. | Data Analysis:
The techniques that can be used in project closeout include:
|
Final product, service, or result transition: This output refers to the transition of the final product, service, or result that the project was authorized to produce according to the project management plan. |
| Project Document Updates: If the project has an iterative lifecycle, the project manager can collect information for the next iteration during the closure of the Project. The Project Manager can also go through the assumption and risk logs and close out any out-of-date items, and update the remaining details. | Meetings: Meetings that take place during the closeout phase will include discussions among stakeholders and other individuals who are associated with the project about the performance and the deliverables that were achieved during the Project lifecycle. | Final Report:
The final report provides a detailed version of the project’s performance. It can include information such as:
|
| Accepted Deliverables: At the end of the project, the project manager should have all accepted deliverables, the approvals for each deliverable, and the final approval and acceptance for the final product to consider the closure of a project. | Organizational Process Asset Updates: The Organizational Process Assets process during the closure stage will allow the project manager to keep all the project files related to the undertaken project updated. The process also allows, the collection of historical information for future reference. The project manager is also required to formally check the project closure documents closely and end the project on an official note. Organizational process assets that are updated include Project documents, Operational and support documents, Project or phase closure documents, and Lessons learned repository. | |
| Business Documents: Business case, benefits management plan, etc. | ||
| Procurement Documents: To close the contract or project, all procurement documentation are collected, indexed, and filed. Information on the project schedule, scope, quality, and cost performance along with all contract change documentation, payment records, and inspection results are registered. | ||
| Organizational Business Documents: Performance reviews, project management plan updates, project document updates, lessons learned, etc. |
5 Ways to Manage Effective Project Closure
1. Communicate Closure
A project’s successful closure relies heavily on how well you communicate with the stakeholders during the closure phase. There are several key things that need to be communicated clearly to avoid misconceptions and dissatisfaction:
- Notifying the finance and account department and communicating to all stakeholders that the project is officially ending.
- Communicate to vendors that project close is nearing to ensure prompt billing process and receipt of contracted products and services
- Informing functional managers about when the project is closing and when you will release resources back to them
- To ensure proper closing of project books
2. Transfer Deliverables
Transferring project deliverables to the customer is a tricky step. For example, if your project was creating an updated version of an existing software product, then delivering that to the customer and deploying it in the customer’s environment is a part of the closure process. In most such cases, you will also be required to train the customer on how to operate and maintain the product. In these situations, you might have to send a member of your team to the customer’s site to train them on product functionality, features, and maintenance. This would also be a good opportunity for you to collect feedback from the customer on the product and the overall working relationship during the execution of the project.
3. Review the Project
It is essential to look back at your project and identify the highs and lows. Conduct a meeting with your entire team and wade through the entire project. Celebrate and reward successes, however small they may be. Log them to keep a record and for other project managers in the future to learn from. Ponder over the mistakes and analyze the reasons for them. Encourage suggestions from the team members on how things can be done better in the future.
4. Complete Documentation
Any project will have elaborate documentation. Initial project requirements, project plans, execution phases, vendor contracts, documents on development phases, and testing records are some of them. Ensure that all these documents are in place along with a cover sheet that will contain a brief outline and the team members involved in them. Arrange all documentation in chronological order to enable easier location in the future. Additionally, also ensure that all vendor contracts are fulfilled, closed out, and in place. Finally, the final project report needs to be completed.
5. Reassign Resources
When the project comes to an end, throughout the closure phase, you are going to have team members with a lot of free time since their contribution to the project is pretty much done. It is time to release them now. In accordance with the time periods that you have agreed with the functional managers, you will have to release team members back to their functional departments. In the case of contract workers, you will have to make the decision if the contract workers need to be allocated to a different project or released from their contracts.
Conclusion
Project closure is an educational experience where you get to learn a lot of project management aspects than what you did during the execution of the project. Try and resist the temptation to jump onto a new project as soon as one project is over without completing the formal closure process. An efficient project closure creates value for all project stakeholders. Learn about more such processes in the project life cycle with the PMP certification training.
Know more about Project Management best practices through Invensis Learning’s Project Management certification training on PMP Certification Classes, CAPM Certification Training, PRINCE2 Online Training, Project Management Fundamentals, etc.
