Part 1 – Overview
All major public sector enterprises have an increasing investment in software (and IT in general) and a growing need to earn a better return on their investment. Recent studies have shown that software projects are often over budget and behind schedule. Although studies come up with differing numbers, generally statistics show that:
- Over half of all medium and large software projects do not deliver their expected benefit, and exceed their schedule and budget.
- Over half of the medium and large software projects either fail completely (management pulls the plug) or require big recovery efforts to get them to completion.
Software projects, due to their scale and scope present special problems. Management often over estimates the business improvements with optimistic delivery dates before there is a good understanding of the cost and time it will take to complete the project. User needs change, staff members move on, and the scope, schedule and budget begin to grow. The software development project soon becomes a black hole, into which the organization pours dollars and people. Agency management hears nothing but good news from project management and contractors until it is too late. The problems start to surface and “blame game” begins; management blames the project staff, the project staff blames the contractor and the contractor blames the project staff. The end result is a software project that is over budget, delivered late, and the business needs and quality expectations are not met.
So what to do?
This is the first in a multi-part series of posts analyzing the causes of failures in public sector software projects and proposing some pragmatic solutions.