Release Management Best Practices

Overview

The Release Manager is accountable for a Release’s process and orchestration — acting on the Release Owner’s behalf to help define the Release, plan for it, staff it, and help define and facilitate the execution of all work by the appropriate Release-associated team members across every Environment (development, packaging, deployment, testing, documentation, etc.), as well as coordinating with other teams and their concurrent Releases. Unlike the Release Owner, the Release Manager can become a genuinely distinct, dedicated role once the Asset/Product/Service is large enough to warrant it. In smaller enterprises, the responsibilities of the Release Manager may be performed by the Product Owner, the Product Manager, the Development Team Lead, or a Business Analyst, on behalf of the Product Owner

Assign a clear Release Manager to manage the work for all Releases.

Benefit(s)

Since the Release Manager acts as a specialized type of Project Manager, having a clear and accountable Release Manager ensures all work is clearly defined, planned for, has assigned resources, and is executed, both technical and non-technical, in and for each environment that a Release moves through.