Release Management

Release Management Software for Best Practices

Organizations often realize it is difficult to manage expectations from proposing a solution to an internal or external customer and maintaining customer satisfaction through release and deployment. The relationship between receiving requests and modifications through the delivery of a service or product is complex; it may include multiple iterations and incorporates initial and updated requirements that often have different interpretations from all parties involved.

While release management is required in the ISO 20000 standard and the CMMI frameworks, managing change, release, and deployment systematically is a necessary component to implementing a solution effectively.  Beginning with planning and designing a solution to incorporating verification and validation, release management is the foundation to meeting new requirements or incorporating changes to existing products.  Deciding the best approach and method to manage release and deployment is critical, as it may prevent major issues, decrease development time, eliminate costly mistakes, and ensure the end product meets customer requirements.

Formalizing release management requires an organization to consider the following:

  • What tools do we need to manage release and deployment that work for both management and staff?
  • What is our process for project planning, scheduling, designing, developing, testing, quality assurance, and deployment?
  • How do we incorporate all changes involved in a release?
  • Who is responsible for approvals?
  • Do we have a roll-back plan?
  • How will we capture requirements, estimate time and track progress?
  • Who will ensure that we achieved the expected result?
  • How can we prevent issues and project slippage?
  • How do we handle peer review and verification and validation activities?
  • What risks should be considered and do they involve customers or services?

ITG’s CENTRE software can be integrated with our consulting solutions to improve your implementation timeline and provide your organization with an efficient solution to manage your release and deployment process.

CENTRE’s module for release management helps:

  • Facilitate the entire life cycle of release and deployment.
  • Manage relationships between all change requests and approvals associated with a specific release.
  • Identify configuration items involved in changes and releases; integrate updates and version control.
  • Provide enforcement for validation and testing activities.
  • Incorporate best practice principles to prevent delays or major issues, improving performance.
  • Create custom alerts and escalations based on organizationally defined criteria.
  • Provide dashboards of release activities for oversight and governance.

If your organization needs a solution for release management or is considering implementing ISO 20000-1:2011 or CMMI, ITG can work with you to streamline your implementation.  Incorporating CENTRE’s release management module with our consulting services allows you to add speed and definition to managing release and deployment of services without having to determine what method to use.  The implementation focus can shift to areas of importance; providing for more control and consistency and reducing rework and errors for decreased costs and increased efficiencies.

Please contact us today to learn how CENTRE can provide the ideal change management solution.