Based on our experience, one of the top issues in project delivery is the availability and usage of a key decision log. This is a binding matrix that can streamline communications and expectations and bring in a lot of delivery efficiency.

Once the solution blueprint and the solution design document have been prepared, people seldom go back to the original requirement, that is, the Business Requirement Document (BRD), the situation, use cases, and exceptions to understand, or people seldom recall what happened previously to trigger a particular approach. Hence, it is crucial to always maintain a key decision log that can be accessed by all the relevant project stakeholders.

Any decision that could alter the course of the project and impact its objectives must be documented. Also, the circumstances of making the decision should be noted as this will complete the entire story of the decision. A decision may impact one or more requirements, so all the impacted processes must be mentioned in the key decision as well. This will allow the various owners of the project to participate in the impact analysis and, hence, the decision-making process.