The document discusses best practices for closing projects. It describes the key steps in project closing including finalizing all activities, archiving project information, ensuring work is complete, releasing resources, and conducting a final presentation and report. It emphasizes the importance of capturing lessons learned to improve future projects and conducting knowledge transfer to ensure smooth transitions.

1. Note: See the text itself for full citations.

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 Describe common ways to close or terminate projects
 Discuss the process of closing a project or phase performed
as part of project integration management
 Explain the importance of a project close-out meeting and
knowledge transfer
 Describe the contents of a customer acceptance/project
completion form, final project report, and lessons-learned
report
 Summarize advice on closing projects

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 Closing projects or phases involves finalizing all activities
and bringing the project or phase to an orderly end
 It includes archiving project information, ensuring the
planned work is complete, and releasing organizational
resources
 It often includes a final presentation and report
 It is also important to reflect on what can be learned to
improve future projects. As philosopher George Santayana
said, “Those who cannot remember the past are
condemned to repeat it.”
 It is also important to plan for and execute a smooth
transition of the project into the normal operations of the
company

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 Integration: A project is completed, and products and
services created are integrated into operations; most
common approach
 Addition: A project creates a new product or service that
results in a new unit in the organization, such as a
department, division, or company
 Extinction: A project ends because it was successful and
achieved its goals, or it was unsuccessful or superseded;
termination by murder is when there is a sudden end to a
project.
 Starvation: A project ends by decreasing its budget or
suddenly ending funding; also known as withdrawal of life
support

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Knowledge area Closing process Outputs
Project integration
management
Close project or
phase
Project documents updates
Final product, service, or
result transition
Final report
Organizational process
assets updates

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 Project documents updates: All project documents should be reviewed
and marked as final versions, and the lessons learned register should
include lessons learned during the closing process
 Final product, service, or result transition: Project sponsors are usually
most interested in making sure that the final products, services, or
results are delivered and transitioned to the appropriate part of the
organization.
 A final project report and presentation are also commonly created during
project closing
 Updates to organizational process assets: Recall that organizational
process assets help people understand, follow, and improve business
processes. Examples include plans, processes, policies, procedures, and
knowledge bases, such as templates and lessons-learned reports. During
closing, the project team should update appropriate process assets,
especially the lessons learned repository

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 Summary level description of the project or phase
 Scope objectives, the criteria used to evaluate the scope, and evidence
that the completion criteria were met
 Quality objectives, the criteria used to evaluate the project and product
quality, and the verification and validation information
 Schedule objectives including planned and actual milestone delivery
dates and reasons for variances
 Cost objectives, including the acceptable cost range, actual costs, and
reasons for variances
 Summary of how the final project, service, or result achieved the
benefits that the project was undertaken to address.
 Summary of how the final project, service, or result achieved the
business needs identified in the business plan.
 Summary of any risks or issues encountered on the project and how
they were addressed
•7

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 Some of the most useful lessons learned come from project
failures. One very visible, painful project failure occurred in
1986 when the Space Shuttle Challenger exploded only 73
seconds after liftoff, killing all seven astronauts onboard. You
can watch CNN’s live video of the disaster by searching for
“Challenger disaster live on CNN.”
 In 2011, the Associated Press released a video called
“Challenger's Lessons Still Echo 25 Years Later.” Roger
Launius, Senior Curate at the Air and Space Museum, stated,
“What had failed was the communication process where
people at a lower level thought there was a problem, but that
did not get to the higher level. So communication is the key
thing to change.”

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 In closing the VAPR project, Jeff, Pat, and their
teams prepared:
◦ A customer acceptance/project completion form
◦ A final report and presentation
◦ A formal review of the transition plan’s status
◦ A lessons-learned report
 Pat also organized a luncheon for the project teams
to celebrate a job well done

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Project Name: VentilatorAssociated Pneumonia Reduction (VAPR) Project
Project Manager: Jeff Birdwell & Pat Wager
I (We), the undersigned, acknowledge and accept delivery of the work completed for this project on behalf of our
organization. My (Our) signature(s) attest(s) to my (our) agreement that this project has been completed. No further
work should be done on this project.
Name Title Signature Date
Marilyn Shoemaker Chief Nursing Officer Marilyn Shoemaker June 30
Was this project completed to your satisfaction?__X__ Yes _____ No
Please rate this project on a scale of 1-10, with 10 being the highest. __10__
Please provide the main reasons for your satisfaction or dissatisfaction with this project.
The project met and exceeded my expectations. In my 13 years with this organization, I have never seen caregivers so
willing to adopt new technology and change their clinical workflows. I believe one reason for this was because the
clinical project phase, Phase II, was led by a nurse who could speak the caregivers’language. Pat did a great job
gaining the buy-in of clinical leadership as well as staff nursing and therapists. She and Jeff, the Phase I project
manager, worked very well together. Jeff and his team created a solid technology foundation upon which Pat’s team
could build the clinical aspects of the project.
Please provide suggestions on how our organization could improve its project delivery capability in the future.
One suggestion would be to train other clinicians, like Pat, to manage clinical projects. Jeff did an excellent job
mentoring her during this project, but perhaps formal project training for Pat and other nurse and therapy leaders
could help AHS be more successful with clinical projects. Staff from the PMO, like Jeff, could serve as mentors,
coaches, and providers of tools and systems to facilitate the management of projects.

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1. Project Objectives
2. Summary of Project Results
3. Original and Actual Scope
4. Original and Actual Schedule
5. Original and Actual Budget
6. Project Assessment
7. Transition Summary
8. Lessons Learned Summary
Attachments:
A. Key Project Management Documentation (business case,
project charter, etc.)
B. Product-Related Documentation (database information, training
documents, etc.)

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Introduction
The main goal of this project was to develop a new clinical workflow to support IHI Ventilator
Bundle compliance at AHS. In order to create the workflow the caregivers required information from
our electronic medical record systems that indicate if the IHI bundle is being followed by AHS
caregivers. This information required the creation of a database, interfaces, import scripts, and reports
that must be maintained daily. AHS IT leadership assured the project sponsor that these technology
deliverables could be supported by the current Enterprise Data Warehouse (EDW) team, and thus no
ongoing maintenance costs needed to be budgeted.
Transition Status
The EDW team was engaged during Phase I and has been supporting the new deliverables since the
bulk of Phase I was completed in January. The helpdesk has been provided a step-by-step guide to
answer calls about the new workflows. The VAPR system has been added to the helpdesk ticket
system and includes all required contact and escalation information. The online training system for
VAPR will be managed as part of the annual hospital training program and has been reviewed and
accepted by the clinical training oversight group.
Incomplete Transition Work
The new documented clinical workflows must be incorporated into the nurse educator training
program. The clinical training oversight group has accepted responsibility for doing this within 90
days. That work is considered outside the scope of this project.

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 Everyone seems to agree that it is important to document and share
project lessons learned, yet a survey of 961 experienced project
managers found that although 62 percent had formal procedures for
learning lessons from projects, only 12 percent adhered closely to
them.
 The Project Management (PM) Perspective research team wanted to
discover how organizations capture lessons learned and apply them
to new projects. Their findings were very discouraging. Although
many tools and processes were in place for capturing lessons-
learned information at the end of a project, few organizations
bothered to use them.
 “End-of-project post-mortems were infrequently and inadequately
performed. Project managers cited the usual problems: a lack of
time, key people not available, a culture of blame. And, as one
interviewee noted, ‘Most projects don't have enough budget to
support any good closure.’"

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1. Did the project meet scope, time, and cost goals?
We met scope and time goals, but we used $20,000 of contingency funds. Costs were still within our goal.
2. What was the success criteria listed in the project scope statement?
The following criteria outlined the project scope and success criteria:
 Project completed by the end of the next fiscal year (June 30)
 Project completed for $980,000 or less.
 Sponsor rating of at least 8/10.
 VAP incidence rate is reduced by 25% within 90 days of go live.
 VAP incidence rate is reduced by 35% within 180 days of go live.
 VAP incidence rate is reduced by 50% within 270 days of go live.
3. Reflect on whether or not you met the project success criteria.
We finished on time and within budget, and our sponsor rating was 10/10. The last three criteria
will be analyzed at the time periods specified by the AHS Performance Improvement department with the
results provided to the Ops Leadership Team within two weeks of the data collection.
4. In terms of managing the project, what were the main lessons your team learned from this project?
The main lessons we learned include the following:
 Having clinical leadership publicly supporting the project was critical to gaining clinician buy-in.
 Naming an experienced clinician as project manager helped gain clinician buy-in and allowed the
project team to have a subject matter expert on the team.
 Experience clinicians who are not experienced project managers can be very successful if
coached and mentored by a senior project manager.

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 Disaster struck the Boston Marathon on April 15, 2013, after two explosions killed three people
and injured 282. Three CIOs from hospitals in the area reflected on the how their health IT
systems handled this difficult situation.
 Jonathan Teich, MD, chief medical informatics officer for Elsevier and as assistant professor of
medicine at Harvard: "There are several aspects to information management in a disaster. As
you can imagine, this is a situation full of many more patients with much higher acuity than
we're used to, often with types of problems, such as blast injuries, that we train for but do not
see very often."
 John Halamka, MD, CIO of Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center in Boston, a practicing
emergency physician and Harvard professor: "From an IT perspective, maintaining a high
bandwidth, reliable and secure infrastructure was key. The demand for communication – voice,
email, social media and streaming video was very high. The scalability built into the design of all
our systems – networks, servers, storage, and client devices – served us well…I was in touch
with all my managers and staff by 4 p.m. There were no open IT issues. Aside from the shock
and eventual anger we all felt at having this happen in our home town, it was a typical
operational day."
 Jim Noga, vice president and CIO Partners HealthCare: Noga said that IT’s role was definitely
subordinate to the direct care providers. “It is our job to ensure we make available to them the
IT resources they need. IT participates in emergency planning exercises and understands the
importance of steady-state, assuring the high availability of systems, keeping communications
channels open and otherwise staying out of the way. That is our focus during a crisis.”

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 At this meeting, like the kick-off meeting, you should
invite key project stakeholders. Some people call this
close-out meeting a post-mortem since it is normally
held after the project has died or been put to rest. The
project champion should start off the meeting, and the
project manager and his/her team should review
information like the following:
◦ The scope, time, and cost goals and outcomes
◦ The success criteria and results in achieving them
◦ Main changes that occurred during the project and how they were
addressed
◦ The main lessons learned on the project
◦ A summary of the transition plan

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 Employee knowledge or human capital is a key asset
 Recall that knowledge management is a process
included under execution
 Knowledge transfer is the process of communicating
knowledge that was developed by one person or in one
part of an organization to another person or other parts
of an organization
 In particular, people who will take over products or
results produced as part of the project would need to
spend time with project team members so they
understand what is involved in detail

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 Many industries (restaurants, hotels, entertainment parks, etc.) have used themes when
designing facilities, but it’s a recent trend for healthcare organizations. Children’s
hospitals, in particular, have begun adopting themed design due to fierce competition and
customer expectations, and a memorable interior helps them stand out among their peers.
For example, the University of Minnesota Amplatz Children’s Hospital in Minneapolis
adopted a “Passport to Discovery” theme where each floor has a unique animal, color,
and habitat. Patients are issued a “passport” at check-in, and they receive stamps on
their passport as they travel through the hospital. The theme also assists in navigation, as
the terrazzo floor in the main lobby includes a beautiful compass pattern laid at magnetic
north, and anyone with an actual compass could use it to find their way around the
hospital.
 Tsoi/Kobus & Associates, the design firm for this project, documented several do’s and
don’ts in their lessons learned for this project:
 Don’t be too abstract when selecting your theme.
 Be sensitive of the ages, ethnic, and socioeconomic backgrounds of all users.
 Avoid an unsophisticated or cartoonish approach.
 Don’t let the theme upstate the architecture.

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 Jeff and Pat met personally with anyone responsible for
maintaining the products or services operationally, primarily to
ensure that the functional teams were comfortable picking up
the operational aspects of the work.
 If required they would provide additional support or mentoring
on the transitioned project deliverables, even though the
project may have technically ended.
 One of the success criteria for the VAPR project was to
reduce the incidence of VAP by 25% within 90 days of
implementation.
 Pat made sure that the Quality Council understood this and
other goals so they could monitor the performance of the
changes initiated as part of the VAPR project.

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1. "Best" or "better" practices are not adopted; they're adapted.
2. As Jack Welch said, "You don't have a better or best practice until someone else is
using it."
3. The learner is important, and making learning easy is critical or people will recreate
"good enough."
4. Focus on general, broadly applicable practices first, rather than choosing highly
specialized practices.
5. Do something, see what works, then broaden the scope.
6. Peer assistance is a critical tool to begin, and even conclude, the process.
7. Uncover success stories, communicate the stories, and assist the learning and
adaption processes.
8. Facilitation is critical to the process - both the role and the capability.
9. Documentation/video/audio artifacts are the starting point for discovery and
productive conversation.
10. To facilitate discovery of best practices, leverage communities wherever possible.

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 Plan for project closing. There should be tasks in the
WBS and resources allocated for closing
 It will be much easier to close a project if the project
team captures lessons learned and other important
information required for closing as soon as possible
 Project managers should take time to thank their team
and other project stakeholders and have some type of
closing celebration

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 Popular television shows likes American Idol and The Voice
have great closing shows. For example, in 2016, several famous
celebrities (Kelly Clarkson, Jennifer Hudson, etc.) performed
before ending the fifteenth season of American Idol and
announcing the new winner, Trent Harmon.
 Many viewers get tears in their eyes watching the last few
minutes of Extreme Home Makeover episodes. Ty Pennington
and his team of designers, builders, volunteers, friends, family,
and neighbors gather to see the new home built quickly for a
family in need. Everyone enjoys the tradition of shouting,
“Move that bus!”

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 Closing projects or phases involves finalizing all activities
and bringing the project or phase to an orderly end. It
includes archiving project information, ensuring the planned
work is complete, and releasing organizational resources.
 Closing outputs related to integration management include
project documents updates, final products, services, or result
transition, a final report, and updates to organizational
process assets.
 Helpful advice for closing projects includes planning for
closure, documenting lessons learned and other important
information as soon as possible, and celebrating project
closure.