The multi-site rollout planning guide.

This guide walks the planning arc of a multi-site technology rollout, the same arc MLS runs internally, phase by phase. Use it to structure your own program or to interrogate any partner who wants to run one for you. The core principle throughout: each phase exists to produce specific artifacts, and the next phase does not start until they exist.

Phase 1: Define the outcome

Before sites, before vendors, write down what done means for the program as a whole. What is installed, configured, and working at every location? What evidence proves it? What is explicitly out of scope? Who accepts the result? Ambiguity here compounds at every site downstream.

• Artifacts: outcome statement, acceptance criteria, scope boundary, named business owner.

Phase 2: Know your sites

Assemble the real site list, then challenge it. Formats, regions, landlord rules, union requirements, trading hours, freeze dates. Then survey: physically, with a structured instrument aligned to the install plan. Every unknown a survey retires is money recovered from the contingency line.

• Artifacts: validated site list, survey data per site, per-site deltas against assumed scope.

Phase 3: Write the runbook

The runbook is the install, in writing: sequence of tasks, materials per site type, configurations, labeling standards, test and verification steps, evidence requirements, escalation rules, and rollback procedures. If a step lives only in someone's head, it will be performed differently at every site.

• Artifacts: runbook, per-format bills of materials, verification checklist, escalation matrix.

Phase 4: Pilot deliberately

Choose pilot sites for coverage of your variation, not convenience: one of each format, one difficult region, one worst-case building. Run the full runbook including evidence capture and closeout. Treat every exception as a runbook defect and fix it in the document, not just at the site.

• Artifacts: pilot results, revised runbook, corrected labor and materials estimates.

Phase 5: Sequence the waves

Build waves around readiness, not geography alone. A site enters a wave when it has passed the readiness gate: confirmed access, verified materials, validated local scope, documented constraints. Ramp wave sizes as the runbook proves stable. Protect the schedule with explicit blackout dates from operations.

• Artifacts: readiness checklist, wave schedule, communication plan, decision calendar.

Phase 6: Execute with a feedback loop

During execution, three disciplines carry the program: status on a fixed cadence, exceptions escalated the day they are found, and runbook updates flowing forward into remaining waves. Verification happens on site, against the checklist, before a site is called complete.

• Artifacts: status reports, exception log, evidence per site, running runbook revisions.

Phase 7: Close like an auditor is watching

Program closeout is not the last install; it is the last record. Every site verified, every evidence package complete, documentation handed to the systems that will live with it, and a lessons file for the next program. If a site cannot be proven complete, it is not complete.

• Artifacts: per-site closeout packages, program closeout report, documentation handoff, lessons learned.