Closing Your Project: The Steps You Need to Take

Adriana Girdler

The essential steps you CAN’T skip when closing out a project Are you getting ready to bring a project to close and you’re wondering how …

The essential steps you CAN’T skip when closing out a project

Are you getting ready to bring a project to close and you’re wondering how to close out the project? There are certain steps you need to take when closing out a project that will be critical to the project’s success and your success as a project manager.

You don’t want to just get your main project tasks done and then leave everyone hanging. Closing out a project the right way is critical. So, here are the tips you need in order to successfully close out any and every project.

1. Double check

The first thing you need to do when closing out your project is ensuring you’ve satisfied all your project goals. Make sure the scope statement has been fulfilled and deliverables have been achieved.

2. Make it official

Now you get to declare that the project is officially over! This is a critical step because you don’t just want to leave everybody hanging. And this doesn’t just involve letting your team know that the project is over.

Send out an email to declare this to your team, stakeholders, and anyone that you’ve communicated with regarding the project. Next, you’ll want to close out any projects and then move on to your project celebration.

Having a celebration provides a psychological closure to all who were involved in the project. Closing with a celebration is a great way to say goodbye to people and celebrate all the hard work you’ve done.

3. Conduct a project review

I call this an After Action Review (AAR). After a project is over, it’s important to review how things went. What went well? What came to fruition? What didn’t? What challenges did you face?

You do an AAR to learn from it. You don’t want to reinvent the wheel completely on your next project – you want to take what was useful and apply it in the future so that each project can be more efficient and effective than the last.

Other key steps when closing out a project

These aren’t the only steps you need to take when closing out a project. There are other key steps that are critical to follow. I want to make sure you’re aware of everything you need to do in order to successfully close out a project. So, I made a video where I explain these tips in detail as well as a couple essential ones that I didn’t mention here.

So, don’t stop here! Let’s chat over on YouTube so that together, we can ensure your project’s closing is as successful as it can be.


I really hope that you found this helpful – and if you did, it would mean so much to me if you would share it on your social media.

Meanwhile, if you really are committed to mastering your next project, do consider taking my SLAY Project Management online course where I show you step-by-step how to successfully manage a project, plus you get access to every template you will need, along with detailed video instructions on how to fill them out.

-Adriana

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Adriana Girdler is a project manager, productivity specialist, entrepreneur, professional speaker, facilitator, visioning wizard, and author. As President of CornerStone Dynamics, Adriana is one of Canada’s prominent business productivity and project management specialists—helping both individuals and businesses do what they do, only better. She is a certified master black belt lean six sigma with over 20 years’ experience improving how companies work.

She also holds both PMP (project management professional) and CET (certified engineering technologist) designations. She’s a Tedx speaker, as well as a HuffPost and Thrive Global contributor. She has been interviewed on Global, CBC, CTV, CHCH, 680News Radio, Newstalk 1010, Sirius XM and published in the Globe and Mail and numerous industry magazines. WANT ADRIANA'S FREE ONLINE TRAINING? In 45 min, learn Adriana's 5 project management secrets she use on EVERY project. Sign up for the Free Webinar here: THE FAB FIVE FUNDAMENTALS OF PROJECT MANAGEMENT

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