It's one of the most common sentences in a systems project: we'll figure out training and rollout once the build is done. It's also one of the most expensive mistakes a project can make.
"Later" usually means "never"
Once a system is technically live, the pressure that funded the project disappears. The budget's spent, the team's attention has moved on, and "we'll handle training after launch" quietly becomes a task nobody owns anymore. It's not that anyone decided to skip it. It's that there was never a real deadline forcing it to happen.
The hidden cost isn't the project, it's the workaround
When people don't trust or understand a new system, they don't necessarily complain, they just quietly build workarounds back to the old way. Those workarounds cost more over time than proper training would have, because now you're paying for two systems at once: the one you built, and the informal one people actually use.
Why this gets deprioritized every time
Change management doesn't show up on a demo. It's not a feature anyone can point to. It's invisible when it's done well, and only visible, painfully, when it's skipped. That makes it the easiest thing to cut under a deadline, and the most expensive thing to have cut once you see the aftermath.
What building it in from day one actually looks like
It doesn't need to be complicated. A clear owner for adoption, not just deployment. A real feedback window in the first few weeks after launch. And leadership visibly using the new system themselves. None of that is expensive. It's just easy to forget to plan for.
Building change management in from day one costs less than fixing adoption after the fact, every time.
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