Project close-out and handover – a general overview
The goal of project management is to obtain stakeholder acceptance of the project result. This means that the stakeholder agrees that the quality specifications of the project parameters have been met. In order to make this go smoothly, the stakeholder and project manager must have a well-documented criteria of performance in place from the beginning of the project. This information should be documented in the project management plan which should include all changes requested through the life of the project.
Objective, measurable criteria are always best, subjective criteria are risky and open to interpretation. There should be no room for doubt or ambiguity, although this is often difficult to achieve.
The project may not be complete when delivered to the stakeholder. Some final project areas that may need to be considered are:
- Documentation requirements
- Complete drawings
- Final report
- Provision of people trained on operating product of facility
- Customer training
- Project audit
- Update risk and work registers
- Settle all invoices
- Equipment and hire returns
- Warranties and guarantees settled
- Update financial systems
- Document lessons learned
Although the project close-out and handover are typically the final phase of the project this does not mean that the relevant activities should only commence when the previous stage is complete. On the contrary, it can be seen by the list above that work such as as-built drawings should be developed as the project progresses through the earlier stages and be ready for handover as soon as the work is complete.
Finally, project team members need to be reassigned; surplus equipment, materials and supplies disposed of; and facilities released.
http://2020projectmanagement.com/2013/02/project-close-out-and-handover-a-general-overview/
Yes, but I humbly suggest that is not a complete list of the risks.
I have come across this many times in practice and summarised what I learned from several projects in the attached article. Although it deals with the commissioning and handover of IT projects the risks and their mitigation strategies will be adaptable to your case.
You say: " There should be no room for doubt or ambiguity, although this is often difficult to achieve".
While ambiguity is always easier to negotiate, because the parties can impose flexible interpretations on the success criteria, non-ambiguity MUST be achieved before sign-off. Otherwise disagreement at the end is unavoidable. So to avoid disagreement, objective criteria need to be unambiguous and measurable. It is worth the effort! You will thank yourself at the end if you are the project manager.
I also address this in the attached article.
Good luck!
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The most important challenges facing the project implementation is the process of preparing the feasibility study involves rigorous scientific standards give real indicators of project success and sustainability in implementation
A lot of challenges that is to be experienced by executing in one's own institute/lab.
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