Activity: Write CM Plan

Purpose To describe all CM related activities to be performed during the course of the product/project lifecycle. To document how product related CM activities are to be planned, implemented controlled and organized.
Steps Write the CM Plan Review and Approve the CM Plan Maintain the CM Plan
Input Artifacts: Vision Business Case Software Development Plan (SDP)	Resulting Artifacts: CM Plan
Frequency: The CM Plan needs to be written by the beginning of the Elaboration Phase following project approval, and then re-visited through the project lifecycle at the beginning of the Construction and Transition Phases.
Worker: Configuration Manager

Workflow Details:

Core Workflow: Configuration & Change Management

Plan Project Configuration & Change Control

Write the CM Plan

Purpose

The Product CM Plan describes all CM related activities to be performed during the course of the product/project lifecycle. It details the schedule of activities, the assigned responsibilities, and the required resources (including staff, tools and computer facilities).

The Artifact: Configuration Management Plan describes the necessary input for an effective CM plan. The template is intended to serve as a guideline. The intent of each section should be addressed within the context of a given project/product. It should not be an onerous task to product the plan, nor is it intended that the plan impose undue ceremony and bureaucracy on the project staff.

However, the plan is an important document that is used to ensure that organizational assets are appropriately safeguarded.

Review and Approve the CM Plan

The CM Plan is developed once the Project Vision and Business Case have been approved. It is written in parallel with other project planning documents by the Project Manager, and is reviewed by all affected groups.

Although the CM Plan is approved by the Project Manager, it needs to be reviewed by all affected parties. As such, it should be reviewed by the Configuration Manager, key developers and integrators.

Maintain the CM Plan

The Project CM Plan should be re-visited at the beginning of each phase (construction and transition) to ensure that the overall CM strategy is still relevant to how the project is being developed.

The Project CM Plan itself needs to be placed under configuration control, and should be checked into the 'plans' sub-directory of the overall æProduct StructureÆ.