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what is a project closure

by Zack Trantow Published 3 years ago Updated 2 years ago
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In other words, Project Closing is the combination of the following when applied to a project:

  • Assurance that all the work has been completed,
  • Assurance that all agreed upon project management processes have been executed, and
  • Formal recognition of the completion of a project—everyone agrees that it is completed.

Project closure is the critical last phase in the project management lifecycle. During project closure, the team reviews the deliverables, then compares and tests its quality to the intended project outcome. Then they share the deliverables with the project's client.Nov 19, 2021

Full Answer

What are the steps in closing a project?

  • Making certain that all documents and deliverables are up-to-date and that all issues are resolved;
  • Confirming the delivery and formal acceptance of deliverables by the customer;
  • Ensuring that all costs are charged to the project;
  • Closing project accounts;
  • Reassigning personnel. ...
  • Dealing with excess project material. ...

More items...

Which activities form part of project closure?

The scope of the project closing process includes:

  • Approval and acceptance of project deliverables and reviewing if they meet the requirements
  • Transferring project documentation and plans to the assigning partly for archiving
  • Issue management, financial, and risk management closure
  • Gathering the lessons learned from the project
  • Conducting project closure meeting and releasing the project team

How to open a closed project?

Open, reopen, and close projects

  • Opening a project. On the Welcome Screen, click the Open link. ...
  • Managing multiple projects. Each project is opened in its own window. ...
  • Reopening recent projects. PyCharm keeps the history list of the recent projects, from which you can select the desired one. ...
  • Closing projects. ...
  • Switching between projects

Why is project closure important?

Why is project closure important?

  • Make sure your work is complete. Following a predefined project closure process ensures that your work is complete and that you haven’t forgotten any tasks in your project plan.
  • Provide clear next steps. ...
  • Capture lessons learned. ...

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What is project closure checklist?

A project closure checklist (or project closeout checklist) is used by project managers to evaluate the business outcomes when formally closing a project. It helps assess project activities such as actual performance versus baseline objectives, unaddressed issues, and lessons learned within a project life cycle.

What is normal project closure?

1 Normal closure: The common condition of project closure is when the project is completed as planned. This is when the project objectives are achieved, the client accepts the project and normal project closure commences.

How do you write a project closure?

How to create a project closure reportLabel the document. ... Write an overview of the project. ... Describe the project's accomplishments, outcomes and results. ... Describe the project's scope. ... Craft a project performance analysis. ... Highlight challenges and risks that developed.More items...•

What are the main reasons for a project closure?

Here are the red flags you should watch out for:Expensive or does not meet company's goal. Make an estimate of the total cost of the project in the planning stage itself. ... Your competitors are doing a better job. ... Project gets out of control. ... Important or priority project comes up. ... Failure in testing process.

What are the five types of project closure?

5 Types Of Project ClosureNormal: the project goes to completion.Premature: the project is completed early and meets performance specifications.Perpetual: the project keeps getting extended primarily because of changes in the constraints.More items...

What are the four types of project closure?

Besides the types of project termination, these four fates are project termination by extinction, project termination by addition, project termination by integration, and project termination by starvation.

What are the 7 steps to closing a project?

7 steps to closing a projectFormally transfer all deliverables. The first step to closing out your project is to finalize and transfer the project deliverables to the client. ... Confirm project completion. ... Review all contracts and documentation. ... Release resources. ... Conduct a post-mortem. ... Archive documentation. ... Celebrate.

What are the 5 phases of a project?

Developed by the Project Management Institute (PMI), the five phases of project management include conception and initiation, planning, execution, performance/monitoring, and project close.

When should a project be marked as complete?

Only when all activities related to the project have been completed, the project is finished. If the actual goal has not been achieved, this is called a project termination.

What is failed project closure?

Failure to conduct Project Closure could potentially: put the organization at a considerable amount of risk, prevent the organization from realizing the anticipated benefits from the deliverables of the project, result in significant losses to the organization.

What is project closure?

Project closure is the last stage of a project, when you tie up loose ends, communicate your results, and debrief with your team.

Why is project closure important?

It feels great to achieve your final milestones or hit your goal—but that doesn’t mean your work is finished. After you’ve toasted to your success, there are still some important tasks to check off your list before you officially reach the end of the project.

How do you know when a project is complete?

Before you close your project, you have to determine if it’s complete. But what exactly does that mean?

How to close a project in 8 steps

Closing a project doesn't have to be hard. As you work on projects, you’ll learn what works and what doesn’t work for your team. With that knowledge, you can develop your own project closure best practices.

Close with confidence

High five—you’ve just successfully closed your project. You’ve checked all the boxes and tied up all the loose ends. Now you can move on to your next initiative with peace of mind, knowing that everything is taken care of and you have a concrete plan for next steps.

What is handover project?

handover the project results to the customer and/or user, combined with an official celebration

Can we ask the customer / end user of the project result for their satisfaction?

We can ask the customer / end user of the project result for their satisfaction.

What is project closure?

According to PRINCE2, the objectives of the project closure process are to:

What is the purpose of a formal closure?

A formal closure is also a clear closure, which means you can properly hand over the project and responsibility to the client.

What is the purpose of deliverables in a project?

Deliverables– to reach the end of the project and start the closure process, the project manager hands over the documentation for the stakeholders to sign off.

What is the last phase of a project?

The last phase of a project is project closure. It’s here that the project is formally closed and the Project Board receive a report on its overall success. Here, you’ll find out why this process is so important and how to do it correctly.

What is the role of finance in a project?

Finances – pay off any remaining invoices and close any project-related contracts that are still open. Resources – the project’s resources, from equipment to people, should be released from the project. If they’re owned or employed by the company, reassign them to another project.

Can you start an end project report?

While you can create most documents earlier in the project, you can only start the End Project Report during closure. You can present this report as a document, email, presentation or embed it into a shared project management tool.

Is it important to end a project the right way?

It might seem like the least important process, since it doesn’t cover any of the actual project work. However, there are three big benefits to ending a project the right way.

What is project closure?

Project closure is the process of finalizing and finishing a project. It includes any task that will help wrap up lingering issues and archive project documents and files.

The 7-step project closure checklist

As a project manager, it’s your job to ensure that objectives have been met and the project is ready to be closed. Once you’re sure of that, you’ll need to complete this 7-step checklist:

Getting used to the project closure phase

As you can see, a lot goes into project closure. It may even seem overwhelming or unnecessary. But good project management includes a formal closure of the project. Period.

What Is Project Closure?

Project closure is the last stage of a project lifecycle. Here, the project is officially closed and handed over to the operations team. It consists of several important processes like:

What is the closure stage of a project?

The project closure stage is an apt time to review your project: Has your project met the desired objectives? Was there any project scope creep? How well were the extra requirements handled? And more. Hence, use the project scope checklist to analyze the overall performance of your project.

What is a project closure checklist?

A project closure checklist is a list of items that come in handy when you are closing a project. The checklist has a short entry of project closing details divided into different categories like financial, procedural, administrative, contractual, and so on. A project manager can use these checklists to confirm whether all the project requirements are fulfilled before a project goes live.

What is the importance of closing a project?

The closure process comes with many benefits like reviewing the lessons learned, acknowledging team effort, linking up the loose ends, and so on. Always remember to keep a checklist with you to keep track of every minute aspect of project closeout.

What are the benefits of a project closure plan?

A project closure plan comes with immense benefits like understanding your team’s overall performance, appreciating your top performers, documenting relevant knowledge for the future, and a lot more.

Why is project closure important?

Or maybe more objectives were added at the last moment but you managed to tackle them. Hence, project closure helps you make a reality check and improve upon future projects.

What happens when you wrap up a project?

While wrapping up a project, you get to review the project progress as a whole and tie up these missing links. Probably you notice that the documents have some factual errors and you can quickly correct them before the project goes live. Or, the payment might be pending for some of your clients and you can settle the bill to retain your client’s trust.

What is Project Closing?

According to A Guide To The Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK® Guide) – Fifth Edition, “The Project Closing Process Group consists of those processes performed to conclude all activities across all Project Management Process Groups to formally complete the project, phase, or contractual obligations. This process group, when completed, verifies that the defined processes are completed within all of the Process Groups to close the project of phase, as appropriate, and formally establishes that the project or project phase is complete” (2013, p. 57).

Why Is Project Closing Important?

Just as any of the other project management processes (Initiation, Planning, Execution, Monitoring and Controlling), Project Closing serves an important purpose for the organization and helps it avoid unfavorable and adverse scenarios.

What liability can poor closing create to the organization?

As mentioned above, a project that is not properly closed can leave the organization liable to external parties for incomplete payments on contracts, liable to customers for incomplete scope, or liable to regulators for incompliant practices and/or products.

How can I close the project in the best manner possible?

The section above describes a thorough project closing process. Below is a guideline that project managers could use to close their projects comprehensively:

Why do we divide a project into phases?

The purpose of dividing a project into phases is to be able to have phase-gate reviews. They are also widely known as stage-gates, kill-points, phase-reviews, hand offs, and transition-points to name just a few of multiple widely used conventions. Regardless of the choice of name, phase-gate reviews occur at the end of each phase and their main purpose is simply to review how the elapsed phase was performed, and take an informed decision whether or not to proceed to the next phase, and if so, why and how.

What happens if a project manager fails to complete a project?

A project manager who fails to conduct thorough project closing can leave the organization liable for compliance, or liable to a third party for payment, or even portray an image of incompetence because the project seems never to end.

How can project closing support my career?

Just as any professional, a project manager needs to (1) establish consensus that their work is effective and complete, (2) avoid unfavorable situations for the organization, and (3) learn from their experiences.

What is project closure?

Project closure activities ensure the recording project documents, archiving in organizational process assets, making final payments, releasing resources and completing the project. Every project teaches lessons to the organization whether it’s a success or is a failure. So even after a project finishes, the documentation of this project is going to be helpful for completing the coming projects successfully.

What happens when a project is closed?

Once the project is closing, all deliverables of the project must have been completed and delivered to the customer. You should also take formal acceptance of the customer for the completed work.

What is formal acceptance of a project?

Formal acceptance of the project and project deliverables are taken from the customer. Usually, the customer presents a written document, it can be an email or a signed off document, which states that the project has been completed and they accept the outputs of the project.

What is the final performance of a project?

The final performance of the project is calculated and recorded. These include cost performance, schedule performance, quality performance etc. For instance, whether the project has been completed under budget or if it could not be completed, how much did the project exceeded the planned budget?

Where are project management plans archived?

Collected documents are finalized. Final versions of the project management plans and all necessary documents about the project are archived in the company records.

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Steps to Closing A Project

  • The close of the project is the final phase of your job, it’s the last turn of the project life cycle,and like any other aspect of a project, it requires a process. The following are five steps you should take to make sure you’ve dotted all the I’s and crossed all the T’s, as well as taken full advantag…
See more on projectmanager.com

Project Closure Checklist

  • To make sure you close your project properly, follow this step-by-step project closure checklist. 1. Start at the beginning with the project scope documentyou created and make sure that you’ve met all the requirements listed there. 2. Make sure that all deliverables have been handed off and signed by stakeholders, getting their approval and satisfaction. 3. Other project documents mus…
See more on projectmanager.com

Free Templates to Help with Project Closure

  • There’s a lot to keep track of when you’re closing a project. You don’t want to miss out on any critical steps and leave some documents unsigned or not discussing lessons learned to avoid the same mistakes on the next project. ProjectManager is a great software but also the premiere online site for everything project management. That includes dozens of free templates. Here ar…
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Your Project Is Closed – Use Projectmanager For Your Next One!

  • Now we know that proper project closure will help you start your next project on the right foot. If you plan and manage your projects in a centralized project management software—like ProjectManager—you’ll have access to all of your previous projects. That way, when you’re planning a new project, you can quickly review old documents, tasks, comments and templates i…
See more on projectmanager.com

1.5 Steps to Project Closure (Checklist Included)

Url:https://www.projectmanager.com/blog/project-closure

16 hours ago  · Project closure is the critical last phase in the project management lifecycle. During project closure, the team reviews the deliverables, then compares and tests its quality to the intended project outcome. Then they share the deliverables with the project’s client. For more information about how project management works, read this guide about the five phases of …

2.Project Closure Guide | Smartsheet

Url:https://www.smartsheet.com/content/project-closure

17 hours ago A formal closure is also a clear closure, which means you can properly hand over the project and responsibility to the client. It lets you disband the project team, so the project doesn’t incur further costs. It ensures the project met all the original objectives. It also teaches lessons by identifying and addressing any objectives that weren’t achieved. Project closure checklist

3.Videos of What Is a Project Closure

Url:/videos/search?q=what+is+a+project+closure&qpvt=what+is+a+project+closure&FORM=VDRE

7 hours ago  · Project closure is the process of finalizing and finishing a project. It includes any task that will help wrap up lingering issues and archive project documents and files. If you’ve never done a formal project closure, you may wonder why it’s so important.

4.Project closure: 8 steps to finish projects with confidence

Url:https://asana.com/resources/project-closure

12 hours ago  · What Is Project Closure? A project lifecycle can be divided into different stages such as the initiation phase, planning phase, execution phase, and so on. Project closure is the last stage of a project lifecycle. Here, the project is officially closed and handed over to the operations team. It consists of several important processes like:

5.Project Closure - Project Management Knowhow

Url:https://www.project-management-knowhow.com/project_closure.html

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6.Project Closure Definition, Checklist & Report | UK

Url:https://www.prince2.com/uk/blog/prince2-project-closure

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7.The 7-step project closure checklist to end on a high note

Url:https://www.teamwork.com/blog/project-closure/

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8.Project Closure Steps and Checklist: The Ultimate Guide

Url:https://www.proprofsproject.com/blog/project-closure-steps-and-checklist/

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9.Project closing - PMI

Url:https://www.pmi.org/learning/library/importance-of-closing-process-group-9949

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10.Project Closure Phase: 8 Steps of Closing Process Group

Url:https://blog.masterofproject.com/project-closure-phase/

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