PLAN
REQUIREMENTS
SOLUTION
ANALYSIS
DESIGN
BUILD
TEST
TRAIN/DEPLOY MAINTENANCE
TO THE DOCUMENT OWNER: This document is provided as a guideline and resource. The instructions give detail
about what might go into a potential project. Only you and your team, however, know what will best fit the needs
of your specific effort, and you are encouraged to utilize the document as appropriate to meet those needs.
Project Kickoff Guidelines
This document aims to provide people who will be leading and managing projects with best practices and
guidance for pre-project initiation activities.
Forming a Customer Steering Committee (CSC)
Several documents outline the roles and responsibilities that a CSC has within a project. However, the
formation and proper makeup of a CSC is as critical as the members' participation.
Size and Makeup
Ideally, a CSC will be comprised of no fewer than six and no more than twelve (ideally ten) members to
facilitate coordination and decision making. Finding the correct campus representation for a particular
project is important as well; a CSC should ideally include participation from large and small schools,
colleges, and administrative areas. The following list is a representation and is not comprehensive of
each category:
Large Schools and Colleges
 College of Natural Science
 College of Liberal Arts
 McCombs School of Business
 Cockrell School of Engineering
 Dell Medical School
 Moody College of Communication
Small Schools and Colleges
 School of Pharmacy
 College of Education
 College of Fine Arts
 Jackson School of Geosciences
 LBJ School of Public Affairs
 School of Law
 School of Architecture
Administrative Areas with Small IT Staff
 Athletics
 Libraries
 Texas Advanced Computing Center (TACC)
 President’s Office
 Provost’s Office
Administrative Areas with Large IT Staff
 Registrar
 Admissions
 Financial Information Systems
 Information Technology Services
 Institutional Data Store
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RecSports
UTPD
Purchasing
International Office
Development Office
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Information Security Office
Payroll
University Operations
Parking and Transportation Services
Within each of these areas, consider nominating specific influencers who would best represent area
interests. Other considerations:
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Determine if representatives need to have decision making authority within the area.
Leverage CSC members for gathering community input.
Select a mix of strong supporters as well as skeptics and detractors to vet the best solution.
Ensure there is a member of the governance group that will eventually oversee the service to
act as a representative for the governance committee.
When suitable candidates are identified, formal invitations for CSC membership should be sent. Use the
CSC Responsibilities Framework and CSC Charge documents to communicate expectations for
participation. Finally, schedule a CSC kickoff meeting to initiate the project and review CSC
responsibilities.
Form Project Team
Consider the types of resources that will be needed on the project – developers, business analysts,
project managers, system administrators, etc. For specific personnel, request each person’s time and
commitment from his or her manager. Communicate the following:
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Estimated commitment timeframe for each resource, to mitigate potential project collisions
The project’s priority versus others to which the resource may be assigned
Skills needed to successfully complete the project
Conduct Project Team Kickoff
When the project charter has been approved, perform a formal project team kickoff meeting with the
following agenda:
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Define the project goals, including the eventual outcome and the business importance of the
project. Describe any special visibility this project may have within the university community.
Define the scope of the project and come to a common understanding of what is included and
what is specifically excluded.
Define the project guidelines and constraints. See "Project Norms and Guidelines" below.
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Review the project schedule and phases, if applicable.
Within the project team, also be specific about the roles that resources may be fulfilling in the project.
Informal roles could include system architect, automation SME, testers, documentation specialists, etc.
Revisit Past Projects
Search any shared drives and wikis, and ask tenured staff for potential institutional knowledge to
bootstrap your project. This could include a past list of issues or blockers that may have derailed a
previous effort, requirements or use cases that have already been gathered, or other project artifacts
that may inform your approach.
Establish Project Norms and Guidelines
Explicitly define the following:
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Where will working project documents be stored? Potential locations include Sharepoint, Wikis,
Google Drive, Box, OneDrive.
How often will the team meet? For high-churn projects, teams could meet several times a week
for a ten minute standup meeting to review progress and assigned tasks. Low-churn projects
may only require a single meeting a week to check progress.
Where will tasks be managed? Examples include Sharepoint, Wikis, Jira, Trello.
How will tasks be routed? For example, will a workflow consisting of design, build, unit test,
functional test, acceptance, etc. be utilized?
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