get it done
  • Home
  • Blog
  • About
  • Store
  • Contact
  • Resources
useful stuff that you can use to #helpgetitdone

Statement of Work Templates and checklists 

26/2/2016

0 Comments

 
​The Statement of Work (SOW) is a document, which describes the scope of work required to complete a specific project.  It is a formal document and must be agreed upon by all parties involved.  

In order to be effective, the SOW must contain an appropriate level of detail so all parties clearly understand what work is required, the duration of the work involved, what the deliverables are, and what is acceptable.

Writing a good Statement of Work. What goes into a good SOW (Statement of Work)? 

In this post there is a basic outline of the structure of a good SOW. In addition there are some real world examples and templates that you can use right away of SOWs that you can use for either a project or consulting engagement
Basic structure

•    Reference information (client name etc)
•    Scope of the project or piece of work, linking back to the customer’s business objective
•    Work to be done or work packages
•    What that is not in scope
•    Assumptions
•    Dependencies
•    Exclusions
•    Commercials
•    Acceptance
•    Terms and conditions

Get these included in the SOW and you have a solid foundation for a good commercial engagement and then the delivery teams can get on with execution and the account management team does not have to spend all of their time checking what was in the contract or SOW.


Example #1 : Table of contents template for an ICT Project

Below is a detailed example of a table of contents that could be used to structure a statement of work for an ICT project.

•    Executive Summary Overview
•    Agreement Term
•    Definitions
•    Solution Overview
•    Other Non-Functional aspects of the Solution
•    Delivery Approach
•    Planning
•    Delivery and installation of Software.
•    Lab and Production Environment Install and Configuration
•    Testing
•    Project Deliverables
•    Commercial Proposal
•    Assumptions
•    Exclusion
•    Customer Responsibilities
•    Project Management
•    Project Escalation Path
•    Communications management.
•    Project Schedule
•    Acceptance
•    Schedule
•    Pricing - Fixed Price Services.
•    Pricing – Payment Milestone
•    Warranty

Example #2: Table of contents template for a Consulting project

1.    SOW for XXX Project
1.1.    RELATED DOCUMENTS
2.    TERM AND TERMINATION
3.    DELIVERABLES
3.1.    Background/Context    
3.2.    Deliverables & Activities
3.3.    Professional Services
3.4.    Out of Scope Deliverables
3.5.    Warranty Period
4.    DOCUMENTATION
5.    CUSTOMER REQUIREMENTs
6.    Assumptions and dependencies
6.1.    Assumptions
6.2.    Dependencies    
7.    ACCEPTANCE TEST PLAN
8.    License Term
9.    Project Management Services
9.1.    Project Managers
9.2.    Steering committee
9.3.    Project team
9.4.    Other resources
9.5.    Key positions
9.6.    Project management methodologies
9.7.    Reporting
9.8.    Meetings
9.9.    Escalation
10.    CONTRACT MILESTONES
10.1.    Contract Milestone descriptions
10.2.    Liquidated damages
11.    CHARGES


Example #3- Table of content template for an ICT project


1    INTRODUCTION
2    DEFINITIONS    
3    PROJECT DESCRIPTION
4    SCOPE DEFINITION
4.1    IN SCOPE
4.2    OUT OF SCOPE
4.3    SCOPE CHANGE    
5    ASSUMPTIONS, CONSTRAINTS AND DEPENDENCIES    
5.1    ASSUMPTIONS    
5.2    CONSTRAINTS    
5.3    DEPENDENCIES    
6    PROJECT RISKS    
7    PROJECT SCHEDULE    
8    DELIVERABLES    
9    DELIVERABLE TOOLS DEFINITION    
10    ACCEPTANCE AND ACCEPTANCE CRITERIA    
10.1    ACCEPTANCE PROCESS FOR FIXED PRICE DELIVERABLES    
10.1.1    Custom Software Acceptance    
10.1.2    Acceptance Testing Procedure    
10.1.3    Document Acceptance    
10.2    ACCEPTANCE CRITERIA FOR T & M DELIVERABLES    
11    CUSTOMER NAME RESPONSIBILITIES    
11.1    DECISION POINTS AND PROCESS    
12    MATERIALS, EQUIPMENT AND FACILITIES    
12.1    BASELINE ENVIRONMENT    
12.2    PROVIDED BY CUSTOMER NAME    
12.3    PROVIDED BY SUPPLIER
12.4    PROVIDED BY THIRD PARTY
13    PROJECT ORGANISATION STRUCTURE    
13.1    PROJECT TEAM ORGANISATION STRUCTURE    
13.2    ROLES AND RESPONSIBILITIES    
13.3    STAKEHOLDERS    
14    PROJECT COMMUNICATION    
14.1    COMMUNICATION MATRIX    
14.2    COMMUNICATION PLAN    
14.3    STATUS MEETINGS    
14.4    STATUS REPORTING    
14.5    PROJECT ESCALATION PROCESS    
15    PRICE AND PAYMENT    
15.1    FIXED PRICE    
15.2    TIME AND MATERIALS: DAILY RATE    
15.3    TIME AND MATERIALS: HOURLY RATE    
15.4    TRAVEL AND ACCOMMODATION EXPENSES    
16    STATEMENT OF WORK APPROVAL    


Checklists

1.    Has the Statement of Work (SOW) be signed by both the customer and the supplier?
2.    Has the project scope been documented, reviewed and signed off by the customer in the SOW and does the SOW include payment milestones and the customer's responsibilities. For example the customer may be responsible to provide some project resources.
3.    Have the assumptions, exclusions and dependencies been documented in the SOW?
4.    Have all external dependencies and constraints been documented in the SOW and included in the Project Management Plan?
5.    Are all deliverables clearly described and identified, with measurable acceptance criteria and, signed off by the customer? Acceptance of deliverables is very important and the statement of work should define for each deliverable what will be the acceptance criteria. For example detailed design might be accepted by signing off the detailed design document after 2 review cycles. Testing might be accepted after the test report is produced showing that there are no outstanding severity 1 or 2 test defects.
6.    If the project includes migrations of data or applications, have they been scoped, priced and planned?
7.    Has a commercial model been prepared that is in line with the project schedule and covering all project costs. 
8.    Are signed purchase orders in place between the supplier and the Customer, and the supplier and subcontractors, and are all authorised changes covered by a signed purchase order?
9.    Are contracts with other suppliers documented?


Further Reading
  1. When drafting the SOW, how granular should the technical piece be?
  2. SOW template
  3. Starting up a project- a checklist


0 Comments

Your comment will be posted after it is approved.


Leave a Reply.

    Categories

    All
    Books
    Events
    Friday Five
    Interviews
    Projects
    Startups
    Tech
    Templates
    Tuesday Tech
    Work
    WWID

    A$4.00
    For the project office to use. A list of things to check off in managing a project grouped into sections from scope, time, budget, quality and management. Instantly check the health of any project by scoring against these 117 questions.

    Shop
    A$4.00
    The following is a project checklist, which can be used by project managers, program managers, delivery managers, pre sales consultants and anyone who is focused on ensuring that all areas of a project are being managed to ensure successful delivery. It is organised around the lifecycle of a project from initiation through delivery and close out.
    Shop
    A$4.00
    Venture Capital investor checklist. This is a useful checklist of what VCs look for when talking to a start up. Useful for the startup wanting to be be ready for their next pitch.
    Shop

    Archives

    November 2019
    October 2019
    September 2019
    August 2019
    July 2019
    June 2019
    May 2019
    April 2019
    March 2019
    February 2019
    January 2019
    December 2018
    November 2018
    January 2018
    December 2017
    November 2017
    October 2017
    September 2017
    August 2017
    July 2017
    June 2017
    May 2017
    April 2017
    March 2017
    February 2017
    January 2017
    December 2016
    November 2016
    October 2016
    August 2016
    May 2016
    April 2016
    March 2016
    February 2016
    January 2016
    December 2015
    November 2015
    October 2015
    September 2015
    August 2015
    July 2015
    April 2015

Photos used under Creative Commons from StevanBaird, berniedup, Finntasia, Sebastiaan ter Burg, Pai Shih, Jim Makos, DonMiller_ToGo, forum.linvoyage.com, Dan O'Cker, AJC1, Sam Howzit, AlexandrMeshkov
  • Home
  • Blog
  • About
  • Store
  • Contact
  • Resources