Decide what deserves to move
Inventory sources and name the owner of each. Identify duplicates, obsolete values, disconnected identifiers and fields whose original purpose is no longer understood.
Build the target people, organization, position and case model before mapping columns. Otherwise, the legacy layout quietly becomes the new architecture.
Rehearse with difficult records
A sample containing only clean rows proves little. Include overlapping positions, changed names, missing identifiers, duplicate people, historical agreements and case documents with uncertain ownership.
- Record every transformation and exclusion.
- Use stable source identifiers where available.
- Require manual review for uncertain matches.
- Protect real personal data during rehearsal.
Reconcile meaning, not only counts
Matching row totals cannot prove that relationships, dates and controlled values survived correctly. Sample records from the perspective of members, administrators, caseworkers and report users.
Define cutover ownership, rollback criteria and a period for controlled corrections. Migration is complete when trusted workflows operate on accepted records, not when the import job finishes.