13 Basic Documents For Your IT Project in 2023

Project documentation is created by a project manager to manage, control and deliver the project value. Each project must have documentation stored either on the Client’s side or Company’s side.

In other words, it is recording the key project details and producing the documents required to implement it successfully.

The list of documents varies for each project. The essential three functions of documentation substantiate it:

• to make sure that project requirements are fulfilled;
• to establish traceability concerning what has been done, who has done it, and when;
• to create better visibility of processes.

Benefits of Project Documentation

• Faster new employee onboarding. Good project documentation gives new team members access to all the knowledge that has been collected throughout the projects, both past and ongoing. New team members can immediately understand decisions made in the past and find relevant information without asking others on the team over many weeks.
• Better cross-team alignment. Thorough documentation brings clarity and transparency to what everyone is working on. As a result, decisions and discussions don’t get scattered over chat and email, less time is spent in meetings, and work is less likely to get duplicated.
• More effective knowledge sharing. The insights and lessons learned from one project can be transferred to new projects. Capturing and sharing this knowledge can help you develop new best practices, prevent repeated mistakes, and continuously improve your team’s performance.

Basic Documentation For a Project/Phase

Project Initiation

During the first few meetings, all known information that a Client (and/or Product Owner) possesses must be collected and stored within standardized documents. This is the period when primary business need is defined initially.

• Project Charter (Project charter is sometimes also known as the project overview statement. A project charter includes high-level planning components of a project, laying the foundation for the project)
• Statement Of Work (SOW is made at the outset of a project and outlines everything that needs to go into your project, including the business case).
• Non-Disclosure Agreement (NDA is a legally binding contract that establishes a confidential relationship. The parties signing the agreement agree that sensitive information they may obtain will not be made available to others).
• Master Service Agreement (MSA is a contract made between two or more parties in which they both agree to most of the terms used to govern any future agreements or future transactions).

Project Planning

The main job of the Project Manager at this point is to define all stakeholders who may impact the project in any way. He should also analyze the known scope, divide it into phases, and develop separate stages for project success. It would be nice to have a Business Analyst involved.

A Tech Lead validates the proposed solution within given resources and constraints. He defines the preliminary tech stack which will be used for development.

It is the right time to agree upon the quality and its measurement. Also, the Definition of Done (DoD) is an essential part of any project phase.

To sum up, the steps above, creating a Project/Agile Charter to determine responsibilities and document high-level details is required.

Then comes the most challenging and interactive part, project planning, creating PMP (project management plan), and determining the required documents.

The resource planning process is an essential part when it comes to commitment.

A team creates a backlog of functional pieces to work with, usually broken down into tasks by following the plan. The main point is to see whether the scope can be completed simultaneously with other tasks.

If any is required, the next important piece falls under procurements or would be more beneficial than custom development.

• Business Requirements Document (This is a complete description of the system to be developed. It contains all interactions users will have with the system and non-functional requirements).
• Stakeholder Management Document (It establishes clear guidelines for communication among the project’s stakeholders, management of their expectations, involvement & impact).
• Sprint Planning Document (The process is represented and documented as the list of items agreed by the team to be completed at the end of the iteration. It could be reflected in the forecast planning).

Project Execution

It is worth stressing the importance of having an alternative plan if unpredictable circumstances occur regarding risk management. It is continuous and seamlessly integrated within the other processes.

If we work with Agile methodologies, estimating the backlog is easier and quicker, at least for the first iteration (Sprint). If it is not Agile, we are agile and adjust the processes.

In addition to that, it must be clear to a Client that the accumulation of technical debt must be avoided at any cost by using such practices as code refactoring. It must be part of the regular development process.

The complete schedule of deliverables depends on the backlog items estimation.

The project budget considers the needs, resources, risks, quality assurance, KPIs, and other costs.

• Change Management Document (This document states exactly what must be changed, how it might alter any pre-existing plans and existing functionality for your project, and how to plan the mitigation of the disruption that the change could cause to the project creation process).
• Risk Management Document (This document is used to consider the potential project risks involved and to record the best ways that you can respond to them as a team).

Project Monitoring

Our goal is to make adjustments quickly, follow the plan, and work with the team effectively leading it.

There are quite a few metrics regarding this point, like team building activities and the level of customer satisfaction to be measured regularly.

It is a common practice to get feedback on the completed work, challenges, and achieved milestones to match the Client’s needs and/or requests.

Comparison of KPIs with baselines leads to reacting to changes and reviewing the risks to manage contingencies. Periodical confirmation that we are heading in the right direction is the green light to managerial activities and keeping the team motivated.

During the monitoring and controlling activities, the project manager oversees the processes and may create other documents on demand. We use documentation, such as a Stakeholder Communication Document, project roadmap, and project status report to ensure that the project work is implemented according to the plan. Feel free to use other documents to keep a project or individual work on track (e.g., OKR).

Project Closure

Once the project or phase has been finalized and before the celebrations start, you need to formally round things off by moving into the closure process.

Recording the lessons learned casually would be helpful as we may create company policies based on them.

Another informative document contains the credentials for different services we may use while working on the project. Keeping and/or handing over the code clean and safe is our responsibility.

After the final Client’s feedback is given, we may consider that the phase is fully completed and all information is properly recorded for future reference.

The closing activities usually end up with greetings of successful completion and open ability of the subsequent improvements, updates, and maintaining the Client’s success.

• Sprint Review Document (It represents the visual part of deliverables done during the Sprint. Also, another essential part of the meeting is to receive the feedback, which has to be recorded and processed).
• Sprint Retrospective Document (This document sets out what all have learned from the project as a team. It gives everyone an opportunity to put forward formal suggestions for what might go differently next time).
• Project Support Flow (This artifact is a guide and sort of after-sale agreement with warranties explaining how to work and process stakeholders’ requests. This can also be included in the SOW or other agreements).
• Project Closure Document (This document is written confirmation that all the invested parties approved the completed project or phase. Effectively, they agree that the project has been kept on track and that the expectations of all of its stakeholders have been met).

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