How You Manage Project Gates

Gates are decision and control points in a project plan. Project managers can create gates in the project timeline where all the stakeholders review the project results to date and decide if the project should be continued or terminated. A project manager can:

Create a gate
Add stakeholders (as gate approvers) to the gate
Start the gate review process
Change the gate status
Delete the gate

Lifecycle of a Project Gate

Here are the stages in a project gate lifecycle:

Project manager adds a gate to a project plan.
Project manager adds appropriate stakeholders using the Manage Task Details page. By default, the gate status is Closed.
Project manager changes the gate status to In Review to initiate the review process.
The application sends a notification to each stakeholder.
Stakeholders review the project results to date and set their approval status to Approved or Rejected. Optionally, stakeholders can also add comments. For example, they can suggest revisions.
The application sends a notification to the project manager after each stakeholder sets the approval status.
Project manager changes the gate status to Open, Closed, or Terminated based on the status changes and comments from stakeholders.

Note: Project managers can open a gate only if all the stakeholder approve the gate.

If a project manager deletes a stakeholder after the status of a gate has been set to In Review, a withdrawal notification is sent to the stakeholder.

Gate review and notification workflow — This figure shows the gate review and notification workflow.

Gate Statuses

Here's a table that describes all the gate statuses and the next allowable statuses.

Status	Description	Next Allowable Statuses
Closed	Project tasks prior to this gate aren't complete. Project should not move to next tasks yet.	In Review Terminated
In Review	Stakeholders are reviewing the project results to date to decide whether to open the gate.	Open Closed Terminated
Open	Gate review is complete. All stakeholders have approved opening the gate, and the project can continue.	In Review Note: This is a rare situation in which a project manager wants rework on the previously completed project tasks and changes the status back to In Review.
Terminated	Gate review is complete. The stakeholders decide to discontinue the project at this gate.	Closed Note: This is a rare situation in which a project manager wants to reconsider the project and changes the status back to Closed.