Create a Functional Checklist

Learning Objectives

After completing this unit, you’ll be able to:

Explain why a functional checklist is important.
List three typical documentation gaps.
List three types of data included in a checklist.
Explain what a RACI spreadsheet is.

Introduction

Even when you work with a wonderful team and everyone gets along, unstated assumptions about who’s responsible for what can create misunderstandings or slow the project down. That’s why you need to document who’s responsible for each task in a storefront implementation, and why all members of the team need to review the task allocation and agree to it.

Create a functional checklist to track:

Project tasks
Participant roles
Task and functional area ownership

When you explore tasks and assignments in a systematic way, you can identify missing tasks, duplication of effort, and assignment gaps more easily, and you prevent miscommunication and project delays.

Two documents that can help with process are a checklist for operating on Salesforce B2C Commerce and a RACI spreadsheet.

Create a Checklist

We recommend you document who’s responsible for each task in a checklist for operating on B2C Commerce. The checklist helps you focus your team on key areas such as merchandising, operations, and administration. It also helps you identify roles within the merchant’s organization that are responsible for these areas. This isn’t a checklist of all the tasks required for the launch. Instead, it prompts your team to consider what’s needed for effective site operations both before and after launch.

Document Roles and Responsibilities

These are some typical roles for operating a B2C Commerce site. In the checklist, document who fills each role, and whether that function is being provided by a resource within the merchant’s organization, by an external partner or vendor, or by Salesforce.

Project Management
Web Operations
Buying Team
Merchandising
UX Team
Content Team
SEO Team
Analytics Team
Marketing Team
IT

The operating on B2C Commerce sheet typically has two tabs, Ecommerce Business Activities and B2C Commerce Activities, which divide the tasks by overall function.

Ecommerce Business Activities Tab

This tab lists the business-related tasks, which are grouped as follows:

Product preparation
B2C Commerce content production
User experience management
Buying and selling
Business operations
Web operations
Customer relationship management
Customer acquisition

For each task on each of these tabs, document who fills each role and which organization provides the resource.

B2C Commerce Activities Tab

This tab lists the B2C Commerce platform-related tasks, which are grouped as follows:

Service delivery and platform management
Product support
Core platform development

Create a RACI Spreadsheet

A RACI spreadsheet can make your life a whole lot easier.

RACI stands for responsible, accountable, consulted, and informed. A RACI chart is a matrix of the activities or decision-making authorities in an organization, relative to all the people or roles.

RACI stands for responsible, accountable, consulted, and informed.

Action Level	Responsibility	Number of People
Responsible (R)	The person who does the work to complete the task, or who makes a decision.	One person
Accountable (A)	The person who is accountable for the correct and thorough completion of the task. This is the person the responsible role is accountable to and who approves their work.	One person, typically the project executive or sponsor
Consulted (C)	The people who provide information for the project, and with whom there is a two-way communication.	Several people, typically subject matter experts
Informed (I)	The people who must be kept informed about progress, and with whom there is a one-way communication.	Several people who are affected by the outcome of the tasks

A RACI document can have many pages, starting with an overview or high-level summary. Here’s a sample high-level RACI sheet.

Task	Project Management	Web Ops	Buying Team	Merchandising	UX Team
*Planning and Operations*
Management of content calendar		I		R	C
Management of digital asset and image		I		C
PIM Management		R	I	A
Management of pricing and promotions		R	A	I
Management of project docs	A/R	C/I		C	C
Management of Salesforce support and ticketing	C/I	A/R		C/I	C/I
*Business Manager Tasks*
Management of library and content assets		R		C/I
Management of product images (WebDAV)		R		C/I
Management of digital assets (WebDAV)		R		C/I

In addition to a high-level sheet, create one or more sheets that show greater details. For example, picture Management of content calendar as a line item on the second sheet.

This is how the first set of role columns would look.

Project Management
Head of Project Delivery	Project Manager(s)	Business Analyst(s)

To see more columns from the sample, let’s turn this column 90 degrees. For example, Web Operations would have three more columns, and the Buying Team, two.

Project Management	Head of Project Delivery
	Project Manager(s)
	Business Analyst(s)
Web Operations	Head of Ecommerce (Operations)	I
	Technical Analyst(s)
	Operations Analyst(s)	I
Buying Team	Head of Buying
	Category Manager/Buyer(s)
Merchandising	Head of Ecommerce Merchandising	R
	Merchandiser(s)	I
UX/UI Team	Head of UX	A
	UX Designer(s)

You get the idea. Now create your own RACI spreadsheet.

Find Checklist Gaps

One of your jobs—and it’s an important one—is to identify gaps in the checklist.

Use this list to check your checklist. Any question you answer no to indicates a documentation gap.

Are all the tasks listed?
Are all roles listed?
Did you include all the roles and tasks for each type of participant?
Did you clearly identify if a role is owned by the merchant, partner, or Salesforce?
Are there any items where merchant responsibilities are incorrectly assigned to the implementation partner or vice versa?

Now report on your findings and fill in the missing information.

Next Steps

We discussed two documents that help you align project resources, responsibilities, and tasks. Now it’s time to learn about the B2C Commerce architecture diagram.

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