Table 6 below shows the key activities and milestones in Phase 6 Operational Support, demonstrating that at this phase of the WAG process, there are standard activities and milestones with which all development teams are familiar. There are, however, some differences between activities during a traditional operational phase and that in the WAG process, due primarily to the iterative nature of the architecture and development, including:

·         It is critical that the development team delivering the software/systems/processes is available to provide a significant level of support during the operational phase. Unlike traditional systems development, the development team cannot expect to deliver a product and then cease to communicate any further with the customer, as the project will continue in the next iteration.

·         SharePoint solutions typically deliver changes to a process; therefore you must be prepared to make some changes to the deliverable within the operational phase. You must do this – so you should include a budget at the start to allow your team to make some changes. You can move some of the changes requested into the requirements for the next iteration, but some are typically made as part of the operational support.

·         You, with input from your customer, must make a decision at some point in the Operational Support phase to move into Phase 1 of the next iteration, beginning again with the Workplace Architecture Definition.

Table 6: Phase 6 Operational Support Summary