At the end of an IV&V Engagement certain project wrap-up activities need to take place. Regardless of the ICT project lifecycle, The Agency shall hold an End Of IV&V Engagement meeting with the IV&V Provider to finalise the end of engagement.
Figure 4.15 below summarizes the end of engagement activity and scenario.
Figure 4.15: End of Engagement Activities and Scenarios
Report Out
Typical project management project close-out activities are conducted with a focus on lessons learned regarding quality processes and activities. Several key reports are to be prepared, including:
- Final Report i.e. Test Completion Report (TCR), which:
- records the project and its management activities over the course of the project and ensure unresolved items are documented as well.
- assessment of overall SUT quality.
- lists issues from the entire ICT project lifecycle.
- lessons learned.
- any recommendations for future continual improvements.
- Quality Gate Report specifically addresses the entire Engagement phase of the ICT project effort.
The IV&V Engagement is formally closed upon the handover of the abovementioned reports to The Agency.
Handover
If the IV&V Engagement is not continuing further into the operations and maintenance testing of the Production system, then the following are to be conducted at this point:
- Official engagement artefacts and test wares handover to The Agency, and
- Knowledge sharing from IV&V Provider to The Agency.
Normal and Abnormal Closure of IV&V Engagement
There are two (2) types of closure of IV&V Engagement:
- NORMAL Closure of IV&V Engagement,
where the IV&V Engagement proceeds to closure where all deliverables are fulfilled, and show-stoppers (if any) can be overcome.
- ABNORMAL Closure of IV&V Engagement,
where the IV&V Engagement experiences showstoppers that hinders it from proceeding or from being completed. In this situation, the end of engagement could be determined via:
- Mutual agreement with The Agency, and/or
- Enforcement of end-of-contract terms, as applicable.
Suspension and Resumption of IV&V Engagement
The recommended method of mitigating ABNORMAL Closure is to provide for the suspension and resumption of the IV&V Engagement.
In this situation, the following shall apply:
- The Agency must define the suspension and resumption criteria during the Pre-Engagement stage (i.e. in the Tender documents) and must be agreed to by the IV&V Provider and Development Team.
- There should not be more than one (1) suspension declaration by The Agency during any IV&V Engagement.
- A maximum period of suspension must not exceed three (3) calendar months.
- During suspension, the IV&V Provider shall be held harmless and shall have the right to release its resources from the IV&V Engagement.
- Upon resumption, the IV&V Provider shall be given a two (2) weeks’ notice to reinstate the IV&V Engagement.
In situation where the resumption criteria cannot be fulfilled by the end of the suspension period, the project automatically proceeds to ABNORMAL Closure.