Run a Change Control Board

A Change Control Board (CCB) gives baseline changes the same discipline that proposals get: a scope, schedule, or budget change is written up as a change request, reviewed by the right people, and only counts as done when someone marks it implemented.

Set up the board

1. Open Organization Settings, go to the Governance tab, then the CCB section.

2. Add the people who should sit on the board. CCB members can review any change request in the organization, regardless of their role on the project it belongs to, which is exactly what makes them a board rather than another project approver.

Adding and removing CCB members requires the governance manage permission, Owner and Admin by default.

File a change request

Change requests live on the project. Open the project and go to the Change Requests tab, then select New Change Request.

• Choose a type: scope, schedule, budget, resource, or other.
• Describe the change and, where known, its impact: schedule impact in days and budget impact in the project’s currency.
• Set the Approval threshold, the percentage of reviewers who must approve (51% by default).
• Optionally name designated reviewers for this specific request, in addition to the standing board.

Any project member can file a request against their own project; details and impact fields stay editable only while the request is a draft.

The lifecycle

A change request moves through Draft, then Submitted when you select Submit for Review, then Under Review once reviews start, and ends in Approved or Rejected. An approved request is finished with Mark Implemented once the change has actually been made, by a project owner or manager or a CCB member, so the record reflects reality, not intent.

The requester (or a project manager) can select Withdraw at any point before a decision, taking the request out of play without deleting its history.

How decisions are reached

Eligible reviewers are project owners and managers, CCB members, and any designated reviewers on the request. Each casts an approve or reject decision, with comments. The request is approved once approvals reach the threshold; when designated reviewers are named, the threshold is measured against the whole panel. It is rejected only when every panel reviewer rejects, anything in between stays Under Review. The requester is notified in-app and by email when the decision lands.

Note

You cannot review your own change request, even if your project role would otherwise make you eligible. One person cannot be both the proposer and the approver, that is the whole point of a board.

FAQs

Who can see the CCB roster? The people who can manage it, Owner and Admin by default. Everyone else encounters the board through the review flow on their own change requests.

Can a Portfolio Manager administer the board? Not by default. CCB membership follows the governance manage permission, so an owner can extend it to Portfolio Managers through the permission matrix if your organization wants that.

What if a board member leaves or is deactivated? Deactivated reviewers stop counting toward the threshold, so a request is never stuck waiting on someone who can no longer sign in.