Roxanne, you may have to put on the red light

In the usually excellent and always readable “Rearranging the Desk Chairs," the imagination of blogger Michael Krigsman has been captured by the U.K. National Audit Office’s recent report entitled “Delivering Successful IT-Enabled Business Change.”

The report was written in response to the recent implementation programs taking place all over the U.K., particularly in the public sector. Back in 2001, the Queen’s government announced the “Gateway process” program, a system that was supposed to have saved the British feds some £500 million (approximately $977 million) by the end of 2005.

The Gateway review system is reportedly giving a lot more thumbs-down votes these days, however, as November’s government figures showed that 34 percent of the 409 IT projects reviewed by Gateway between April 2004 and June 2006 were judged to be in need of serious help.

Under auspices of the Gateway program, the government awards a rank of “red,” “amber” or “green” to describe how likely the project is to hit its projected target. In the previous two year period, 30 percent of projects got the red light. Meanwhile, greens were given to just 10 percent of the probed projects, half of the 2002-2004 mark of 20 percent.

The UKNAO study examined two dozen IT-enabled programs and projects, from public and private sectors, within the U.K. and overseas. Its introduction notes that successful IT systems are “a crucial element in major government programmes to deliver better services to the public…” In theory, the report “identifies what Government can do to enhance the chances of bringing about IT success and represents a clear challenge to departments to take action to reduce the risk of failure and embrace innovation while safeguarding the taxpayer.”

While “Deck Chairs” focused on the darker side of the report (hey, that’s what that blog exists for, after all), i.e. overriding reasons and causes for system implementation failure, “Delivering Successful IT-Enabled Business Change” was actually designed to focus on success in such projects. The analysis provides three handy reference lists.

From the results of 24 disparate sources, the UKNAO collected three principles essential to successful IT projects:

• keeping senior level engagement clear, informed, and engaged without unrealistic goals and/or promises;

• the “intelligent client” principle, i.e. “understanding the business process the department is aiming to change, having the right programme management skills, training the staff and creating effective and equal relationships with suppliers”; and

• realizing benefits and thorough final assessment of the program’s success.

The NAO lists nine “key questions for departments embarking on IT-enabled business:

• Is the board able to make informed judgments about the department’s capacity to manage change?

• Does the department have in place a decision making structure that will ensure strong and effective leadership of the IT-enabled business change?

• What incentives exist to drive performance?

• Does the department have the necessary program management skills?

• (In cases of U.K. government programs,) what is the natural division of duties between the program and project management center of excellence and the chief information officer?

• How will the department establish and promote an open and constructive relationship with suppliers?

• How clear is the department about the business process that it is seeking to change or develop?

• Does the technology exist to deliver the change?

• Beyond immediate technical success, how will wider benefits be secured?

Finally, the list of reasons for IT implementation failure collected by the UKNAO includes:

• Lack of clear link between the project and the organisation’s key strategic priorities, including agreed measures of success.

• Lack of clear senior management and Ministerial ownership and leadership.

• Lack of effective engagement with stakeholders.

• Lack of skills and proven approach to project management and risk management.

• Too little attention to breaking development and implementation into manageable steps.

• Evaluation of proposals driven by initial price rather than long-term value for money (especially securing delivery of business benefits).

• Lack of understanding of and contact with the supply industry at senior levels in the organisation.

• Lack of effective project team integration between clients, the supplier team and the supply chain.

Captain Krigsman’s conclusion? “The report clearly suggests the causes of IT project failure lies in management shortcomings rather than in faulty technology. Failures result when managers do not possess the requisite skills, hide problems, are in denial, and so on. This report takes a big step toward exposing common reasons for IT project failure.”

“Delivering Successful IT-Enabled Business Change” can be read in full from the NAO official website.

Entries entitled “Eight causes of IT failure” and “Government report: UK IT projects still failing” can be read at the Rearranging the Deck Chairs blog, “An online forum about software implementation failures.”