I always remember when someone asked why i spent all winter working out at my track and fields event 6 days a week in the cold and wet why i did it. I used to tell them that it was for the feeling of winning a race or running a personal best time i.e. continuing to improve and get faster.
When it comes to software implementations it feels often like an anti climax. All this hard work and effort put in by the team, the final few weeks where you experience the roller coaster of emotions and believe you may never make it, and then you go live. The inevitable first day issues on missing logins, machines not working, training forgotten and just hoping for not many help desk tickets and the system not going down.
An idea is to set those go live goals – such as no more than 20 help desk tickets, collection of positive feedback comments from those using the system, a well done from senior leadership and recognition of the unsung effort to implement and a shout out to the team about why this implementation was so important (less we forget why we started it in the first place). And lastly a recognition of each of the team members and the contribution they made to it – always my favorite part as a project manager. Ideas to ensdure the team feels like winners !!

Thoughts?