IT often promises the government much with the big pull being productivity gains and cost savings, but does the governmentthink about IT in the terms of something that will cure its ills or something which could backfire and give it process diarrhea for a decade?
IT often promises the government much — with the big pull
being productivity gains and cost savings — but does the government
think about IT in the terms of something that will cure its ills or
something which could backfire and give it process diarrhea for a
decade?
Contractors dealing with the government have to
make sure that they don't promise the world when they know they
can't deliver it.
If government did think the latter, could anyone blame them?
There has been a trail of broken projects lying in a pile of debris
over the last decade which has strengthened that view.
Think of the NSW government's Tcard project, which started in
the hopes of having something running for the 2000 Sydney Olympic Games Games, but was cancelled
last year by a disgruntled government with a running tab at almost
$100 million. The Victorian equivalent Myki hasn't have an
untroubled start either, running behind budget.
Aussat has been described as a piece of Space Junk by our former
Prime Minister Paul Keating. And what about Sydney Water's IT failure
earlier this decade, which had its budget reduced to a pittance
because the government feared it would use it unwisely?
A report in 2007 by software testing company Planit found that
large Australian organisations were losing an average of $84.7
million on software development projects each year.
Less than 42 per cent were completed on time and budget,
according to that report. Six per cent were cancelled all
together.
Last week at an Australian Internet Industry Association event, the
head of the association's counterpart in the UK, John Higgins,
spoke about his activities over the other side of the world.
According to him, many UK Ministers said in the past that those
from the IT industry were "no better than snake oil salesmen".
When I think of snake oil, I think of unreliability, of a cure
which works because of a placebo effect if it doesn't make things
worse. As pointed out above, IT does have the opportunity to do
just that.
Yet AIIA CEO Ian Birks didn't think that the Australian
government believed that and indeed some recent spending sprees
make me believe he could be right; that IT has successfully been
able to market itself as the medicine it should be, without the
side effects. Indeed, such an image is essential since the world as
we know it can't operate without it.
We have $11 billion of government money earmarked for spending
on the National Broadband Network and just this week Defence said it would tip $700 million into IT so as to achieve savings of
almost $2 billion. NSW is trying again on its Tcard and South
Australia plans to enter the fray. $100 million is being thrown at
Smart Grid technology.
Yet with such projects, their shine will only last so long as
they progress on time and don't become bottomless pits where funds
can be put. They need to show their requisite benefits.
The key to making sure that IT doesn't become a bad word, and
believe me, there are pockets of society who equate it with the
devil, is realism. Contractors dealing with the government have to
make sure that they don't promise the world when they know they
can't deliver it.
It means telling the government when something
they are asking is expensive/unrealistic/complicated. (I'm looking
at you, ERG). It means asking for help when something is going
wrong. It means working to a project goal not a money pot.
We know government is a tempting morsel with its large deals,
and a little white lie could be the way in. But is it worth turning
the industry back into its snake salesmen?