Moving Projects Through the Phase Gate Process

The process graphic is fully configurable and may look different for each project.

Indicating Stage Completion and Readiness for Gates

A project's readiness for the next gate meeting is determined by the completion of the required deliverables in the current stage. When all deliverables for a gate are either complete or indicated as not required, a stage is considered complete and ready for the gate meeting. Users with access to the project can quickly review the status setting for all deliverables in the project on the project's Stages page. Status is also available on the Upcoming Gates and All My Work pages. See Evaluating a Project's Readiness for Gates for more information.

Advancing Projects to the Next Stage

Process Managers, Idea Managers, and Gate Owners enter the decision for a gate to advance the project to the next stage. Consider locking the current or past stages as described in the section below.

Note:  Gate decisions may be determined and recorded based on the configuration of a workflow added to a deliverable within a project stage.

To advance a project to the next stage:

1. Display the project.
2. Click the gate icon in the process model graphic to display the gate details.
3. In the Gate Decision field, select Go.

If the project ends in a gate, and you enter a Go as the gate decision in the last gate, the project is no longer visible in the Work pod on All My Work.

If the Disable Conditional Go Gate Decision system parameter is disabled, Conditional Go is also an option to advance the project to the next stage. Conditional Go indicates that the gatekeepers approved the continuation of the project under a certain set of conditions. Conditional Go gate decisions must be changed to Go before a decision can be entered for the following gate.

Conditional Go is not an option in the final gate because there are no following gates where conditions can be met.

4. Click Apply to save your changes.

Locking and Unlocking Project Stages

Process Managers and Idea Managers with Manage Process rights, and the assigned Project Manager can lock the stage to prevent anyone from changing the deliverables, activities, or resource demands within that stage. Keep the following in mind prior to locking a project stage:

• Workflows that are in progress when a stage is locked remain with a status of in progress, and user's assignments continue to display in the Work pod on the All My Work page; however, the workflow can no longer progress because the action owners cannot make any changes due to editing limitations in the locked stage.
• Items not linked to a specific stage, such as metrics, related documents, discussions, and so forth, are not affected when a stage is locked.
• Finish dates from Microsoft Project are not transmitted to the deliverables and activities in locked stages.
• If your project is using Accolade's integration with Microsoft Project, locking the stage that contains the Project plan prevents additional updates to the plan.
• Deliverable and activity conditions only apply in current or future stages. Completed stages and locked stages in projects are unchanged.

To lock a stage:

1. Display the project and click on the Stages page.
2. (Optional) If you need to lock a previous stage, click the stage in the process model graphic to display the details for that stage.
3. Click on the Lock Stage, located on the action bar.

To unlock the stage, click on the Unlock Stage icon.

Canceling or Stopping Projects

When gatekeepers decide to discontinue a project, Process Managers, Idea Managers, and Gate Owners can change its gate decision within the gate details to reflect that decision. The record of this project having been canceled or stopped remains in the database (until the project is deleted), and allows reporting on how many projects are canceled or stopped at each stage of the development process.

To stop or kill a project:

1. Display the project.
2. Click the gate icon in the process model graphic to display the gate details.
3. In the Gate Decision field, select Kill, or your company's equivalent, such as Canceled or Stopped.
4. Click Apply to save your changes.

After recording the gate decision, complete any termination reports or processes and then close the project if it is unlikely to resume.

Notes:    Stopping or placing a project on hold inactivates the resource demands for the project, removing them from resource availability calculations. Resource Planning is an optional Accolade component that you may not have access to. To implement this solution, contact Sopheon Customer Support . A gate can be automatically set to Go through project migration. If you migrate a project to any gate after the first, all gates before the gate that you migrate to in the migrated project are set to Go.