Stages and Phases
The concepts of "stage" and "phase" both relate to time, but stages are associated with methods (practices) and logical time, while phases are linked to tasks and physical time.
Methods (practices) can be arranged sequentially in logical time, and, if necessary, grouped into stages. For example, when creating the "painted wall" system, we can identify the following methods: puttying, sanding, painting, and drying.
Based on this, by the way, we can also identify the functional parts of the organization that will be responsible for painting the wall. In this functional view, we are not yet specifying when the work will be done or which agents (executors/performers) will carry it out. We will address these aspects when we discuss the tasks.
It is not always possible to immediately identify all the necessary methods, and it is not always convenient to work with a large number of practices, so they can be grouped into specific stages. For example, initially, we might define a "preparation" stage with the practices of puttying and sanding, as well as a "painting" stage with the practices of painting, drying, and repainting.
When creating many systems, it is common to distinguish such universal stages as ideation, modeling, creation, and operation. However, within each stage, unique practices or sub-practices are defined for creating the specific system of interest. Accordingly, substages may also be identified.
Practices within stages[1] and substages are organized in a specific logical sequence; for example, creation usually follows modeling. However, different practices and stages can be implemented simultaneously, unlike phases, which always follow one another in strict physical time.
The list of practices and their logical order are determined by the system's concept and architecture. Each practice must have a corresponding task assigned to it, just as each system function is assigned a structure-module. Each task is carried out by an organizational unit, which plays a certain role according to a specific practice, at a certain time, and using certain resources. As a result, the organizational unit produces a work artifact.
Each phase contains a specific set of tasks, and phases follow one another strictly in physical time. Tasks within a phase are performed by different organizational units, either sequentially or in parallel. Phases are defined by managers who need to obtain certain work artifacts, without which it is impossible to move on to subsequent phases.
For example, a manager may define a phase as the sale of the system. For them, the control point is the signed contract. However, during this phase, in addition to marketing practices, it is entirely possible to go through the stages of ideation and system design, and perhaps even system creation—at least for the first version of the system or MVP. Alternatively, it may be decided not to carry out any system creation tasks until the contract is signed. Therefore, which tasks are included in a particular phase is determined by the managers.
The identification of phases depends on the methods of task management, which will be discussed in the next subsection. Phases of work can be planned in advance or initiated as needed. Tasks can be assigned to all phases in advance; in this case, these are methods of project or process-based task management. Alternatively, tasks can be defined as circumstances arise, which is known as case management.
At the same time, tasks can be organized so that methods that logically follow one another are performed simultaneously. For example, one team is preparing the second wall while another team is painting the already prepared first wall. This kind of separation of methods and tasks, stages and phases, makes it convenient to discuss the activities of creation systems.
And the stages themselves are arranged in logical order, as seen in the list of universal stages. ↩︎