04
Streaming infrastructure · Project lead · SWR/ARD
Starting point
Taking over in the hot phase right before go-live.
The concept was in place, implementation was underway. Then my colleague was given another assignment within the company — and I took over the project completely.
The takeover timeline
01
Supporting project lead
02
Colleague moves on internally
03
Full takeover
04
Owned the go-live
05
Handover to successor
Safeguarding live operations
24h
support as part of the SLA with different service levels
2
support departments: extended capabilities until 5 pm, plus night operations
The most critical point was live: with on-demand a mistake can be corrected, with a live broadcast it cannot. For this, a high-availability concept was developed and tested.
Result
Go-live successful, stable afterwards without major outages.
The handover to the new external project lead worked without any break in the project.
What I take away
You rarely take over projects at the beginning. The value lies in getting up to speed quickly, carrying responsibility when it counts, and handing it over cleanly once the right person has been found.