The main objective of Solution Planning is to produce full costs, a Project Plan and a Business Case accounting for the resources that are made available to the project. This phase confirms that the development plan is realistic and that the Business Case for the project is solid. To do this; further detail work is done on use cases, particularly those that have the greatest effect on the proposed technical solution to ensure mutual understanding of critical functionality. The requirements are detailed enough to understand architectural risks and to ensure that there is an understanding of the scope of each requirement for planning.

Testing approach is also developed as this may have a material impact on the costs of the solution.

The stakeholders approve the scope and vision and release funding for the next project management stage. Between 5%-15% of overall development estimate to be spent on this stage.

Phase starts when an option is selected for detailed planning.

• to further develop the initial infrastructure design
• to organise and plan the project including costs and all project management stages
• to obtain final costs and contracts from 3rd parties
• to detail all uses cases that effect most parts of the design
• to define the testing and release approach
• to establish the project governance
• to assist in the production of the Business Case
• to establish project resources

Main deliverables of the phase are:

• Business Case

Work products that may be used during the phase include:

• Use Cases
• Business Process Model
• Test Approach
• Component Model
• Nodes and Connections Model
• Prototypes (which may require program specifications, test scripts or configuration specifications)
• Project Management Documents

The phase ends when the chosen option has been investigated in sufficient detail to identify all sub-systems:

• operational – should at least be decomposed to level of architecture domain model
• migration/installation
• development

The chosen option has been investigated in sufficient detail to identify how many build cycles will be needed, what releases of functionality can be achieved, and how this will be tested. The Build method is agreed (e.g. Waterfall or Agile).

That the solution costs are detailed enough to enable the production of a Business Case and the Business Case is approved to continue into the next phase.

The following quality management activities need to be performed:

• Peer inspection of the Business Case (E.g. Fagan inspection method )
• PMO quality review of Project management documents
• Quality plan is created
• Deliverables and milestones identified
• Legal review of any contracts
• Resource management approval for all resources required
• Test manager approval of test approach (where applicable)
• Approval for release (where applicable)
• Approval of the infrastructure design (including business continuity etc.)
• Security defined for all environments
• Phase end checklist