Preparing for Launch

Does not apply for soft launches, where there is no substantial existing operation to migrate.

A specifically created launch migration plan is required over the period during the transition to live that covers the following areas.

Plan for Transfer of Stock Position

Plan for a mechanism to export the current stock position from the existing system, and to import this into OrderFlow.

Plan to Ensure No Order Duplicates

Identify a mechanism to ensure that no orders are processed twice.

One way to do this is to create an export of the most recently processed orders on the existing system, and import these into OrderFlow as completed orders. If the same orders get mistakenly imported into OrderFlow, these will be rejected as duplicate.

Line up Required Third Party Support

If third party systems are involved, such as eCommerce and ERP systems, for which integration is being applied, then the support contacts for these systems should be lined up to ensure that they are available when they are needed.

Dry Run

A dry run of the migration steps should be applied before to launch to verify that the migration steps will work reliably.

Develop Migration Timeline

The specific sequencing of the launch steps during the transition to live should be identified and recorded, so that it can be easily played back at the time.

Plan for Launch Support Presence

The timing of the OrderFlow Implementation Engineer's presence on site should be planned. Ideally, this should be just before the transition to live through to a day or so after. This will help to ensure that any issues that arise are identified and addressed promptly.

In addition, offsite support resource should be lined up, so that any offsite actions to support the launch can be accomplished promptly.