Field note
The weekend I called abort twice
A 2pm Sunday milestone, two abandoned attempts, enemy number one — and a third attempt a month later that went smoothly.
I once oversaw a weekend cutover on a critical system with exactly that structure. The rule was set in advance: a defined milestone by 2pm Sunday, or abandon and rewind so the business opened normally on Monday morning.
I called the abort twice. Both times the milestone had not been met, both times the teams were convinced they could still make it, and both times I stopped it. It made me, without much exaggeration, enemy number one of the migration and development teams. The third attempt, a month later, went smoothly.
Where this feeds the guide: Cutover: the abort point and the rollback boundary.