The transfer of a delivered output to the people who will run it, understood as a transition period rather than a single date.
A handover treated as a date produces a meeting, a document and a signature. A handover treated as a period produces the thing that actually transfers capability: the receiving team operating it while the delivery team is still available, then operating it alone while they are still reachable. What surfaces during that overlap is almost always undocumented operational knowledge rather than missing documentation. Continuous delivery makes the transfer feel administrative, because the output has been live for months, which is exactly why the overlap period gets skipped and the knowledge leaves with the team.
Where this comes up
Predictive work gets an ending for free, the day the thing is handed over. Iterative work has to manufacture one, which is why so much of it never formally ends at all.
Three types, separated by one variable: how much authority the office holds. Supportive advises, controlling requires, directive runs the work. Level is a second axis and a different question.