Go Live Checklist

When initially setting up the system - or when setting up a new area of the system

For each Business Process that is to be supported

1. Identify key Process Owner
   1. Provide access to a person who knows this process very well as a key contact / reviewer
   2. They need to be available for:
      1. Discussions about finer points of the process flow requirements as decisions are required
      2. Reviewing prototypes and providing suggestions
      3. Doing testing using prototypes as the configuration evolves
2. Educate us on the core business process
   1. Provide any supporting documents
      1. Examples include procedures, spreadsheets, screenshots of existing system etc
   2. We will evaluate what work is required to configure the system
3. Design any Website or Portal Flows
   1. Website and portal design often affects external users and the process can take time inside your organisation to be approved.  Start these designs early.
4. List all the data you think is required to support the business process
   1. Examples include employees, Assets (Vehicles etc), Customers, Suppliers, Contracts, pricing, images, services sold, items sold etc.
   2. Determine where this data is held and how you will extract and clean it
   3. We will require this data 1 month prior to go live for testing purposes
5. List all the historical data you would like to bring out of existing systems
   
   1. Examples include closed sales orders, purchase orders, bookings etc.
   2. Determine where this data is held and how you will extract and clean it
   3. Provide us with sample data so we can estimate the work involved
   4. We will require this data 1 month prior to go live if there is a large number of these and we need to import it.  
      1. If there is a small number that can be manually typed in then ensure you have the people available at go live.
6. List all the documents (reports or printouts) required for the business process
   
   1. Provide examples of all documents - you can mark up your existing with changes or start from scratch
   2. Sketch up report layouts required - provide examples in excel with formulas if possible
7. Review configurations of the system we present for feedback as the configuration evolves
8. Enter examples into the test system configuration and test areas we ask you to test

As core areas get configured you can enter core data

1. Once we both believe configuration is ready for data entry.  Normally this is done gradually into live as the project evolves.  Live is then copied to test so you can trial using the configuration
   1. Enter data you extracted from your existing systems into our system
      1. Core Data - often manually typed in
         1. Eg employees, customers, suppliers, etc
      2. Historical data (if being brought over)
         1. Eg old sales orders, old purchase orders, old bookings etc.
2. Use the test system to test the required business processes using the core data.
   1. Test all flows - every step of your business
      1. Include reviewing every document produced including emails
   2. Train all flows - no point having an excellent system without people knowing how to use it.

When ready to go live

1. Test any integrations the live system will have - normally the test system does not use integrations
   1. TomTom
   2. eWay
   3. SMS gateway
   4. External Websites
2. Try to close off as many open transactions as you can
   1. pay as many bills and collect as much outstanding debt as you can to reduce the number of open transactions to bring over
   2. Typically open transactions are best manually entered into the system - it provides training for users and helps test 
3. Close off your previous system
   1. Financials - best done by your Accountant
      1. Financial close off on your previous system will provide a balance for every GL account (including bank accounts) on the day you finish in your previous system.  
      2. These balances are to be entered in our system as an "Opening Balances Journal" for the GL accounts.
4. Extract open transactions from your current system
   1. 1. Eg: Sales Orders you have not yet fulfilled, purchase orders not yet fulfilled etc.
   2. If you are manually entering open transactions - make sure you have enough people to enter the transactions
      1. Type these into our system
   3. If we are importing these we will have tested the import previously
      1. simply provide us the file after closing the last day of trading in the previous system
5. Review reports and balances

We will be supporting you all the way and available on the day of going live.

After Go-live we expect to continue configuration

We think that there is nothing like getting people to use the system to really uncover what is needed - somehow people testing do not go to the same level of detail.

So we prefer to go live before the system is complete so we get really good attention from the customer on what they need.

We expect:

1. Go live brings detailed exposure of the business process and may uncover changes that are required
2. The system being used by staff in the business we expect will uncover changes that are needed
3. Often customers decide the system is "ready enough" to use as it already replaces existing systems and so start using it before it is completed