A company deployed a new retail management system and handed it to operations. Operations found many daily requirements unmet and support hours limited; the project team dissolved and contractors left, causing many customer issues. What should the project lead have done initially to prevent this?

Involving operations stakeholders during planning is crucial because it ensures their requirements and constraints are understood and incorporated into the project design from the outset. This proactive engagement helps identify potential issues like unmet daily requirements and inadequate support before deployment, preventing costly post-implementation problems and customer dissatisfaction. Reviewing the project management plan is a general good practice, but without initial input from operations, the plan itself might be flawed regarding operational needs. Increasing support hours or creating a detailed operations manual are reactive solutions addressing symptoms rather than the root cause, which is the lack of early operational involvement in planning.