Week 2 of 8
Who owns testing
Success by Design is Microsoft’s framework for Dynamics 365 projects: five phases and a set of reviews, two of them mandatory. FastTrack runs those reviews for eligible Finance and Supply Chain projects. Neither one executes your tests.
Microsoft’s own guidance is clear on two points testers should quote: performance testing left out of scope is a project risk, and issues in ISV or partner code do not qualify for extra service update pauses. Both land on the customer.
This week: give every testing activity one accountable owner
- List the testing activities: unit, SIT, data migration, security and SoD, performance, UAT, mock cutover, and regression for every service update.
- For each, name one accountable person: customer, implementation partner, ISV or Microsoft. Write "nobody" if that is the truth.
- Put ISV regression in writing: who tests the ISV solution on each preview build, and how fast they fix it.
- Book the Solution Blueprint Review and make sure the testing strategy is on its agenda, not just the architecture.
Number of the week
2
Success by Design reviews are mandatory: the Solution Blueprint Review and the Go-live Readiness Review.
Source: Microsoft Learn, Success by Design (2026)Use this week
- TCoE Operating Model & RACI →
Testing activities against roles, with a check that every row has exactly one accountable owner.
- Testing Risk Register →
Log "no owner for ISV regression" as a risk with a score, not as a footnote.
Next week: environments. Why "it passed in the sandbox" can mean the integration never ran.
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