Task Descriptor: Lifecycle Milestone Review
This task describes how to review the state of the project at the end of a phase and determine whether the project should proceed to the next phase.
Relationships
Performing RolesMain: Additional: Assisting:
InputsMandatory: Optional: External:
Outputs
Steps
Schedule Lifecycle Milestone Review Meeting

The Lifecycle Milestone Review meeting is a meeting between a customer representative(s), the project's management team (the project manager, plus the team leads for the various functional areas of the project team), and the Project Review Authority.

Once the attendees of the meeting have been identified, set a date/time for the meeting to take place. It is important that sufficient lead time is allowed for the participants to review the materials that will be used as the basis for the approval decision.

Distribute Meeting Materials

Prior to the meeting, distribute the review materials to the reviewers. Make sure these materials are sent out sufficiently in advance of the meeting to allow the reviewers adequate time to review them.

Conduct Lifecycle Milestone Review Meeting

During the meeting, the attendees will be mainly concerned with the Status Assessment and the Business Case. See the Issues for Consideration.

At the end of the meeting, the reviewers should make the decision to approve or not. If the remaining issues are few and relatively minor, the customer may decide to accept the product conditionally upon certain corrective actions being taken. In this situation the Project Manager may choose to initiate a new iteration to deal with the issues arising, depending on their significance, or simply deal with issues as an extension of the final iteration, the difference being in the amount of planning needed. If the results of the phase are found to be unacceptable, the Project Manager may be obliged to initiate another iteration, or perhaps the resolution of the problem is taken out of the Project Manager's hands, and left to the customer and the Project Review Authority.

The result of the Lifecycle Milestone Review Meeting can be one of the following:

Phase Accepted  The customer representative agrees that the project has met expectations for the phase, and can proceed to the next phase. 
Conditional Acceptance  The customer representative agrees that the project may proceed to the next phase, subject to the completion of specified corrective actions. 
Phase Not Accepted  The project has failed to achieve the expectations for the phase: either a further iteration is scheduled, or the various stakeholders have recourse to the contract, to re-scope or terminate the project. 
Record Decision

At the end of the meeting, a Review Record is completed, capturing any important discussions or action items, and recording the results of the Lifecycle Milestone Review. If the result was "not accepted", a follow-up review should be tentatively scheduled - if the project is allowed to continue. A firmer date will be set following the planning for the additional iteration.



Properties
Multiple Occurrences
Event-Driven
Ongoing
Optional
Planned
Repeatable