What Goes Wrong When Stage Gates Fail—and How to Fix It
If your stage gating process feels like trying to get through overcrowded toll booths – then something is not working – and you need to fix it fast.
Stage gating is a powerful framework used by business transformation leads, continuous improvement teams, and Chief Transformation Officers to guide projects from concept to execution. It’s meant to ensure that every initiative is rigorously assessed before progressing, reducing risks and maximizing resources. But, as with any tool, its effectiveness lies in how well it’s implemented. When stage gates are poorly managed, they can morph from enablers of success into roadblocks that derail even the most promising initiatives.
In this article, we’ll explore the most common pitfalls in stage gating and offer practical strategies to overcome them. Whether you’re struggling with overly complex processes, unclear criteria, or accountability gaps, we’ll provide insights and real-world examples to help you get your stage gates back on track. Let’s dive into the first—and perhaps most common—culprit: overcomplication.
1. Overcomplicating the Process
A common issue is that the checklist for passing the next stage gate is so long and convoluted that it feels more like navigating a bureaucratic labyrinth than advancing a strategic initiative. Team members are overwhelmed and what should be a straightforward checkpoint becomes an exercise in frustration.
Overcomplication is one of the most frequent stage gate pitfalls. In theory, stage gates should provide clarity and focus, ensuring that only well-prepared initiatives move forward. However, in practice, many organizations overload their gates with excessive steps, redundant documentation, and an avalanche of criteria. While this might stem from good intentions—like ensuring thoroughness or satisfying multiple stakeholders—it often backfires, leading to bottlenecks and disengagement.
Why Does This Happen?
- Overly Complex Gate Criteria: Teams are asked to meet unrealistic standards or too many data points, losing sight of what’s most important. Teams often add more criteria “just in case,” creating a bloated process. Trying to accommodate every stakeholder’s requirement can make stage gates unwieldy.
- Too Many Gatekeepers: Multiple layers of approval or unnecessary steps can overwhelm teams and create friction.
- Lack of Streamlining: The process isn’t simplified or tailored to each project’s scope or importance. Not all initiatives need the same number of stage gates.
- Lack of Streamlining Tools: Without software to automate and simplify workflows, manual processes pile up.
The Cost of Complexity
- Reduced Speed: Overly complex gates slow down decision-making, delaying initiative timelines.
- Team Fatigue: When every gate feels like an uphill climb, team morale and engagement suffer.
How to Fix It
- Simplify Your Gate Criteria: Focus on the must-have criteria that align with your strategic goals and for that specific gate. Gate criteria should evolve gate by gate. Early gates should be simple with limited criteria – later gates should be more involved to try and lock-in initiative value.
- Reduce the Number of Gatekeepers to the Minimum: For example, if the purpose of a gate is to ensure the initiative makes financial sense – then Finance is the main gatekeeper. Ask yourself if anyone else needs to be involved for that gate ?
- Simplify the Process: Evaluate each stage gate for relevance and necessity—remove or merge unnecessary steps. Consider simpler stage gates for Continuous Improvement initiatives and stricter stage gates for large Transformations. Not all initiatives need the same level of scrutiny. Create flexible processes based on initiative size and impact.
- Leverage Technology: Use business improvement software to automate approvals and keep things moving smoothly.
2. Lack of Clear Gate Criteria
If the stage gates lack clear, well-defined criteria for progression then it can feel like traversing a maze. Ambiguity at checkpoints breeds confusion, delays decisions, and often leads to subjective judgment calls that undermine trust in the process.
Why Does This Happen?
- Undefined objectives: Teams aren’t aligned on what “success” looks like for each gate. Its not been communicated to them.
- Shifting priorities: Goals or evaluation criteria frequently change, leaving teams scrambling to adjust.
- Insufficient communication: Decision-makers don’t consistently articulate what’s needed to pass a gate.
The consequences of ambiguity
- Inconsistent decisions: Without standardized criteria, similar projects might receive wildly different outcomes.
- Team frustration: Employees grow disengaged when their efforts feel like a moving target.
- Inefficiency: Time is wasted revisiting decisions or clarifying requirements after the fact.
How to fix it
- Define clear criteria: Ensure every stage gate has specific, measurable criteria tied to your organization’s objectives – use a checklist so that it’s clear to everyone including the initiative owner what is needed.
- Document expectations: Create a playbook or digital repository with criteria and examples for each gate. Make it easy to reference the criteria.
- Train Gate Keepers: Regularly align your leadership team on how to evaluate initiatives objectively and consistently.
3. Poor accountability
Stage gates are collaborative. By definition, multiple stakeholders are involved. But when no one takes clear ownership of decisions or outcomes, things can spiral into chaos – like a relay race where no one is quite sure who’s holding the baton—it’s a recipe for dropped handoffs and lost momentum.
Why Does This Happen?
- Diffuse Responsibility: Teams assume someone else is accountable, leading to gaps in oversight.
- Unclear Roles: Gate-keepers and initiative owners don’t know their specific responsibilities.
- Lack of Follow-Up: No one tracks or enforces action items post-gate approval.
The Cost of Poor Accountability
- Delays: Decisions languish without a clear “owner” driving them forward.
- Missed Insights: Valuable feedback from one stage is often lost or ignored by the next team.
- Reduced Trust: Teams lose faith in the system when accountability isn’t enforced.
How to Fix It
- Assign Gatekeepers: Ensure gatekeepers are assigned at each gate and know their responsibilities.
- Make sure the Feedback Loop is working: Implement systems that automate the gate assignment process and alert the gatekeepers when their approval is required and then track progress at each gate, flag delays, and ensure visibility.
4. Lack of stakeholder engagement
In any transformation initiative, the right stakeholders need to be engaged at each initiative. Whilst its reasonably straight forward for internally focused initiatives – it can be considerably harder for ‘outward’ focused initiatives e.g., support functions impacting other functions – like Procurement or HR.
We worked with one client where Procurement had created a suite of high value initiatives but some of these initiatives directly impacted other departments and they had not been consulted at all. For example, product specs had been reduced to lower cost – but not surprisingly, the impacted departments had differing views on the value of these initiatives!
End customers need to be fully engaged at the outset and need to be directly involved in the gate keeping process to ensure that the entire organization agrees with the initiative before progressing into implementation.
Why Does This Happen?
- Siloed Departments: Some teams are left out of the decision-making process, making their contributions feel less valued.
- Limited Feedback Channels: Feedback from key stakeholders is either not gathered or not acted upon.
- Top-Down Decision Making: Often, decisions are made by a small group of executives without consulting the teams who will implement the changes.
The Consequences of Poor Stakeholder Engagement
- Limited Insight: Lack of varied perspectives means important blind spots may not be identified.
- Resistance to Change: If stakeholders feel they aren’t included in decisions, they may resist the changes being implemented.
- Missed Opportunities: Teams on the ground may identify solutions that top decision-makers are unaware of.
How to Fix It
- Broaden Involvement: Ensure that stakeholders from the right departments or teams are included in the decision-making process, not just at the gates but throughout the entire project.
- Encourage Collaboration: Use tools that promote cross-departmental collaboration and knowledge sharing.
Conclusion: Closing the Gaps for a Stronger Stage Gate System
As we’ve seen, when stage gates fail, it’s usually due to a combination of misalignment, lack of clarity, and inadequate follow-up. Yet, every challenge presents an opportunity for improvement. By ensuring clear criteria, defining accountability, streamlining the process, engaging the right stakeholders, and avoiding overcomplication, you can transform your stage gate process into a true catalyst for success.
The power of an effective stage gate process lies not in its ability to slow things down, but in how it can create a structured path to implementation. When your teams feel empowered and confident in the process, and when they can see the right stakeholders being consulted and the right criteria used at each gate, your organization will be poised for continuous improvement and transformation success.