Project Context
Rippling is launching a new payroll reconciliation workflow for mid-market customers. The project is 6 weeks into a 10-week plan, but the team is now 2 weeks behind after underestimating integration work with two legacy tax providers. You are the program manager for a 12-person cross-functional team and the COO has already communicated the original launch month to several strategic customers.
The project matters because the workflow is expected to reduce payroll correction tickets by 25% and unlock a planned upsell campaign for 40 existing accounts this quarter. Engineering says the current scope is still technically feasible, but only with trade-offs. Customer Success wants the original date preserved, while Compliance is unwilling to launch without full audit logging and tax validation coverage.
Key Stakeholders
Key stakeholders include the COO, Engineering Manager, Head of Compliance, Customer Success Director, and Sales. Their priorities conflict: revenue teams want an on-time launch, while Compliance and Engineering want to reduce risk and avoid a fragile release.
Constraints
- 4 weeks remain before the committed launch window
- $120,000 budget remains; no additional headcount is approved
- Team: 6 engineers, 1 designer, 1 QA lead, 1 data analyst, 1 compliance lead, 1 PM, 1 program manager
- Two external tax-provider certifications each require 7 business days
- One senior backend engineer is allocated only 50% due to a production support rotation
Complications
- A critical dependency from one tax provider is slipping by an additional 5 business days.
- Sales has promised two enterprise customers that bulk correction support will be included at launch, but that feature is only 60% complete.
- QA found a defect causing reconciliation mismatches in 3% of test payroll runs.
Deliverables
- Build a recovery plan for the remaining 4 weeks, including milestone changes and dependency management.
- Recommend what to keep, cut, or phase, and explain the trade-offs.
- Propose a stakeholder communication plan for resetting expectations.
- Define launch criteria, rollback conditions, and post-launch monitoring.
- Identify the top risks and mitigation actions needed to protect the revised plan.
