Salesforce Release Plan Template: A Guide to Streamlined Deployments

Release Planning

Imagine you need to deploy a substantial set of updates, yet you lack a clear record of the components you modified or created, and perhaps some post-deployment tasks are overlooked. Or picture pushing changes to production without informing stakeholders about the system downtime. These are some challenges that could arise when release planning is poorly implemented or overlooked.

A solid release plan is essential for streamlining the deployment process, tracking responsibilities, and clearly defining what, when, and who will handle each task. By practicing effective release planning, organizations can minimize these common pitfalls. In this article, I'll introduce a template you can adopt for a smoother and more organized release process.

Key Components of a Release Plan Template

At the end of this article, I’ve outlined a suggested structure for a release plan containing the following sections:

1. Ticket Number and Subject
   Record the user story, change request, case number, (or whatever you're calling your tickets) for each item being deployed. Adding this would improve traceability.
   
   
2. Release Timeline
   This may also be called as Deployment Window to some organization. This section includes the Planned Release Start Date and the Actual End Time. It would also be beneficial to include who will be facilitating the deployment, in case this role exists. Sometimes they can be known as Release Manager, Release Coordinator, or Deployment Facilitator.
   
   
3. Team and Resource Availability
   List everyone who will be involved on the deployment such as the developers, BAs, architects, and IT manager, who are responsible during deployment and for handling any escalations.
   
   
4. Support Hours
   If the deployment spans multiple hours or days, then a dedicated support team is recommended. An IT Manager or a self-organizing scrum team can assign on-call resources in rotating shifts (e.g. every 8 hours). This ensures that someone is always available to address deployment-related issues.
   
   
5. Communication Plan
   In my experience working with clients where system are integrated with each other, I've found that proper communication is crucial. There are often other teams with dependencies on your changes, and failing to inform them can lead to unexpected issues. Notifying impacted teams or stakeholders ahead of time allows them to prepare and coordinate if a downtime period is needed. This proactive communication helps avoid disruptions and ensures a smoother deployment process.
   
   
6. Apex Code Coverage
   Although it may seem optional, this step is very valuable. Monitoring Apex code coverage ensures validation and deployment proceeds smoothly. Low code coverage can delay or prevent scheduled deployment. Trust me, this can happen!
   
   
7. Package Details
   If using a version control or DevOps tool such as Copado or Gearset, adding the package or build details will be beneficial as it will be easier for tracking of changes, contributors, and approvers.
   
   
8. Backup Strategy
   Every release must have a backup strategy, regardless if it's just a small release or a large release containing many components. Backing up production metadata and data provides a safeguard in case issues arise post-deployment, and rollback is needed.
   
   
9. Components List
   This section would be beneficial for developers for them to track all their work, whether they created, updated or deleted a metadata. This is what the change set or the package will contain so having this allows them to cross-check their package ensuring that all items will be included on the release.
   
   
10. Pre-Deployment and Post-Deployment Step
    Documenting the pre-deployment and post-deployment steps is critical. For example, you don't want to deploy a custom field and in the end, the field-level security was not provided. Include who will perform each task, and note the status - whether it is Completed or still In Progress. Be specific to the steps you will include (e.g. instead of saying "Update Account records", you can put "Update the Industry field on the Account records where Industry is still blank").

Benefits of Using a Template

A release plan template saves time by ensuring all necessary details are documented for every release, reduces errors through a structured checklist, and improves team coordination with a transparent task list.

Conclusion

Release planning is critical to the software development lifecycle. This serves as the last step before informing the users that the features you've implemented is already live. A well-laid plan keeps the team aligned and minimizes deployment issues. 

This template is just a guide, and I encourage you to customize it based on your organization’s unique needs and processes. If you’d like access to a downloadable version, please leave a comment below.