How can you ensure that ERP projects are properly closed out and that lessons learned are captured?

In light of 50+ implementations, it's evident that scope and objectives are vital parts of any project. Through a review of the scope with all stakeholders, you will gain insight into the project. A meticulously crafted scope document will leave no room for assumptions. Scope review helps identify gaps and ensures adherence to timelines. The scope document can be a key document in the event of a dispute. The more time you spend creating a detailed scope document with all stakeholders, the less time you will spend on implementation. Your scope document will determine how quickly you sign the sign-off document

To ensure proper closure of ERP projects and capture lessons learned, follow these steps: 1. Develop a closure plan to finalize deliverables and documentation. 2. Conduct a project review with stakeholders to assess success criteria and gather feedback. 3. Facilitate a post-implementation review to evaluate system performance and user satisfaction. 4. Capture lessons learned through workshops, documenting key insights for future reference. 5. Update the organizational knowledge base with lessons learned. 6. Ensure proper handover to support teams. 7. Close financial accounts and reconcile budgets.

Properly closing out ERP projects involves several steps. A PM can use the following closeout checklist: 1. Project Review: as-is and to-be 2. Formal Sign-off: key stages, systems, processes, controls, training, and documentation. 3. System Documentation: detailing system operations, Job aids, FAQs, and final design. 4. Knowledge Transfer: relevant knowledge to end-users through training/documents. 5. Post-Implementation Support: team to address queries and issues. 6. Post-Implementation Sessions: discussing what went right/wrong. 7. Stakeholder Feedback: from stakeholders, end-users, project team, and management. 8. Closeout: develop a comprehensive project closure report.

Project scope should be outlined in detail to capture all the “in scope” business requirements and flows and as well “out of the scope” requirements, so that this scope document can be used for future phase wise release. Successful project execution depends on defining project scope, plan and steps to follow and execute it. Frequent meetings and check points on project milestone should be captured and reviewed to ensure project execution is still going as per project scope. All these key points leads to successful project completion

Closing out an ERP project effectively involves several steps. 1) Ensure that all project deliverables completed & documented as per the project scope. 2)Encourage open communication to capture insights, Lesson Learned ,best practices & areas for improvement. 3) Collect feedback from end-users & stakeholders regarding their experience. 4) Ensure that all outstanding issues, tasks & contracts related to the ERP project are resolved & closed appropriately. 5) Schedule follow-up reviews after a certain period post-implementation to evaluate the system's performance & gather additional feedback. 6) Encourage a culture of continuous improvement by integrating lessons learned into organizational processes & future project methodologies.

Frequent project milestone review and evaluation should be a key component to ensure project execution is going on as per plan and call out deviations or blockages etc. We can use various tools to capture the data and analytics to take project level decision.

The evaluation should be conducted with the project team from your company as well as from client side. The different perspective is important to take in to consideration. To be able to effectively use the results to better your processes a structured evaluation method should be used. This makes it easier to spot trends.

The hardest post project evaluation to do is along of the lines of "moving to this ERP will improve this business by X%". If it is not clear on exactly what that KPI is, how it's measured, who owns the measurement, and how to view the measurement as successful or not, then you won't know if you're truly successful or not.

Celebrating small wins is critical. Positivity is the biggest work driver, it brings innovation and critical for the long term growth of any company

While celebrating team's achievements we need to remember that different people respond differently to different types of recognition. However, to celebrate the team it is very important to understand its members. This is where the social interactions with the team help enormously and should be cultivated. In addition to celebrating team's achievements, please do not forget to meet the team just to get to know each other better on a more personal level.

The business should know that they are the true owners of the ERP, and not IT. They are the ones who should be driving its use, pushing it to better support their business, and measuring whether it's successful and meeting their goals. IT can be be the gatekeepers and help guide them on how to accomplish all of that, but the business really needs to own it. That has to be clear from the beginning.

Absolutely it is crucial in implementation of any ERP that once it is officially completed, project is handed over to relevant stakeholders or super users assigned from each department. Not only this but having ongoing support is also important as some issues may arise in live environment that was not foreseen during testing and can only be resolved by addressing to support team. There may also be requirement to have customization in standard transactions which can only come in view once users are actually working in live environment.

Take it a step further and assign team members to develop the training guides themselves with the help of the implementation team. This hands on experience will provide valuable lessons as to individual growth and company growth.

Transfer Project Ownership to User community after training user manuals are written and system is thoroughly Tested using ideally through a CRP. (Conference Room Pilot) if found error free direct Go live.

This is a best practice of large and performing enterprises. It is technologically possible to store big data whether structured or not and transform what we need to analyze for better decision making. Human resource management systems provide facilities to record, keep and analyze achievements, lessons learned and other activities performed by every employee together with feedback from the manager or supervisor and team members of ERP projects and operations in this case. These stored facts substantiate employee performance appraisal for determining the right rewards.

Sorry but it's not the last step at all. You should be capturing lessons learned from Day One. Otherwise some will get forgotten. Others will need resolve as you move through the process. Lessons learned are invaluable to our overall eco-system, but they can be really important to the organisation too - and could have implications into other effort happening at the same time. Collaborate on this and make it part of the cycle / sprints of the effort. Communicate your lessons learned across the organisation and your peers, don't wait - you might save someone else the headache you have just been through, and you might learn a thing or two that save YOU having a headache too. Collaboration is a key to this process.

Centralising the results of the lessons learned and making them known throughout your organisation is the hard part. Standardisation is key, make sure each project is evaluated on the same topics within the same structure and publish the results in the same structured way on a centralised place. Don’t wait to add content to this central 'knowledge base' until a full evaluation has been completed, update the findings constantly. Periodically evaluate all lessons learned and adjust your project methodology accordingly.

Lessons learned should be captured throughout the life of the project. It is a good practice to document lessons learned in real time to prevent forgetting about them as the project progresses. Moreover, if some team members leave the project, their lessons learned will remain so they can be retrieved and applied later.

All of those tips are really crucial and valid. I am missing a big one being project governance, cadence, PMO action tracking and transparent stakeholder engagement.

Establish an essential helpline within a private Teams chat, connecting stakeholders and managers directly with the implementation and deployment team for the next six months to a year. This initiative aims to promptly address issues, maintain open communication for progress, and ensure ongoing support.

Here are my top four tips for effective lessons learned: Schedule Dedicated Sessions Encourage Open Communication Document Thoroughly Analyze and Categorise lessons learned.

end user Support Agreements Tier One - Immidiate action Onsite Vs Cost Tier 2 resolve within 3 to 5 hours On site Vs Cost Tier 3 Resolve within 1 -3 days on site or off site pending severity of issue vs cost Annual ERP maitenance Contract What is in scope , what is not ?