Effective Software Project Management

Customer Sign-Off

Customer sign-off can be ceremonial or formal, as described in the following sections.

Ceremonial Acceptance

Ceremonial acceptance is an informal acceptance by the customer. It does not have an accompanying sign-off for completion or acceptance. It simply happens. Two situations fall under the heading of ceremonial acceptance.

• In the first situation the customer must accept the project as complete at the deadline date, whether or not the project meets specification. For example, if the project was to plan and conduct a conference, the conference will happen whether or not the project work has been satisfactorily completed. When it comes to software, there is no ceremonial acceptance. The acceptance follows a very formal process. If the deliverable doesn’t meet the criteria it is not accepted and returned for further work

• In the second situation a project deliverable requires little or no checking to see if specifications have been met—for example, planning and taking a vacation. Often there will be a brief description of desired features of the vacation, but in the end, whatever is planned is accepted. The acceptance is very informal.

Formal Acceptance

Formal acceptance occurs in those cases involving an acceptance procedure, either written by the customer or in many cases, especially computer applications development projects, written as a joint effort by the customer and appropriate members of the project team. Typically this done very early in the life of ...