Reply to: Ministry of Justice writes off £56m on duplicate IT project

[vetran]

Well that probably tells you one thing ..... that internally they recognise that Steria was not the root-cause of the failure.

Normally its 'Big Outsourcer' has the best bribe customer contact days.

[BrilloPad]

I am shocked. Government prints money and does not give it to a bank. Even worse, it gives it to ordinary working folks.

[DaveB]

Well that probably tells you one thing ..... that internally they recognise that Steria was not the root-cause of the failure.

Not really. It means Steria managed to sell UK Gov the same thing twice, get paid for the first one and then drop it without actually having to deliver anything before getting paid for the second. I'd call that a win if I was in their shoes.

[speling bee]

Meh £56 million is small change. Barely enough to put someone on trial for phone hacking in todays money.

Really the waste needs to be at least £500 million before the papers can start beating people up over it.

+1. The real news is that they've saved £444 million.

[tomtomagain]

And just to round it off:

Canned Project - Run by Steria
New Project - Run by a consortium headed by....... Steria.

Someone is in line for a decent bonus this year.

Well that probably tells you one thing ..... that internally they recognise that Steria was not the root-cause of the failure.

[Sysman]

I am sure all these cold calls I get are from people in the UK. They may have Indian voices but they have names like Lucy or George so they must be British.

I liked the news article from several years ago which reported that Indians were watching East Enders so they could chat about it when doing sales pitches.

Just the mention of that programme would have had me slamming down the phone.

[DaveB]

And just to round it off:

Canned Project - Run by Steria
New Project - Run by a consortium headed by....... Steria.

Someone is in line for a decent bonus this year.

[Flashman]

Meh £56 million is small change. Barely enough to put someone on trial for phone hacking in todays money.

Really the waste needs to be at least £500 million before the papers can start beating people up over it.

[vetran]

Sometimes they agree. Sometimes they don't. Sometimes they agree one day and change their minds the next.


But it's far too convenient to blame "IT" for large project failures ... much less painful than admitting that the reason the project failed was because issues within the wider organisation such as a lack of motivation with staff, poor oversight by senior management or that it was sabotaged by deep-rooted vested-interests.

I have seen plenty of times when the users try to blame IT when they have changed their mind, that's why I get every spec in writing.

[tomtomagain]

No they agree but when the personnel change the requirements change.

Sometimes they agree. Sometimes they don't. Sometimes they agree one day and change their minds the next.


But it's far too convenient to blame "IT" for large project failures ... much less painful than admitting that the reason the project failed was because issues within the wider organisation such as a lack of motivation with staff, poor oversight by senior management or that it was sabotaged by deep-rooted vested-interests.

[SueEllen]

I've seen some projects fail in my time but very rarely is it actually to do with the technology. It's usually because the recipients of the project never wanted it in the first place or couldn't agree on how it should work.

No they agree but when the personnel change the requirements change.

[Doggy Styles]

Comments are golden...

Yes. The general gist is that the government should not have computer systems at all, because they are always procured from mates and are always fecked up.

[tomtomagain]

It always amuses me that these front-page failures are always described as "IT Projects". As if it has been done in isolation by some bunch of techies and gone wrong because of the technology.

Whereas we all know that an "IT" project in any large organisation is 10% technology and 90% business change. And change is hard.

I've seen some projects fail in my time but very rarely is it actually to do with the technology. It's usually because the recipients of the project never wanted it in the first place or couldn't agree on how it should work.

These large projects should not be described as an "IT Failure" but as the "Organisational failure". But then again that would be too hard for a lot of people to admit to.

[original PM]

I worked on a project for MoJ to add welsh bilingual to the Libra system, which cost £4million. At the time it was costing a little over £1k a year for manual translations of documents when welsh defendants requested them.

The upgrade will have paid for itself in another 3 thousand nine hundred and ninety-five years.

This in a nutshell is what happens in so many companies.

Some one moans about a boring process they have to do as an exeception once or twice a month and decides it should be 'automated' which will only see the ROI in about 30 years.

People will start being told to man up, do you job or fook off and find another one.

[xoggoth]

I am sure all these cold calls I get are from people in the UK. They may have Indian voices but they have names like Lucy or George so they must be British.