Universal benefit - £0.425bn to be written off.

[Deleted User]

IT is not always much different for public or private projects

The issue with public projects is they often have artificially derived political deadlines and changes in direction

I remember working every evening and weekend for 3 weeks, just because the minister for health had put an artificial deadline on one of our projects (i.e. never actually considered who was available to work and how long the work would take)

Edit: I've also worked on an IT project where the entire thing was scrapped by Gordon Brown as one of the first things he did when he gained office as PM. Nice one Gordon, I'm glad I busted my gut on that project too.

grizzly1911

michaels wrote: »

But a lot of banks don't and yet they seem to manage to get different legacy systems to work together after mergers and add a web front end that appears to make all the bits work together like a seamless whole. (98% of the time anyway).

I wonder if a big issue is the difference between making a system work for everybody, rather than just everybody who chooses to use it (with a selection bias working against Govt IT, those who are unabel to use IT are probably over-represented in those who qualify for universal credit).

Also of course with private sector IT, people chose to use it and thus are happy to fit in with the supplier's process where as with govt IT there is a perception that the IT should support the process the customer knows (and loves?!)

Bank front ends might look OK but their back end stuff away from basic number crunching isn't always that pretty.

Buying anything tailor made is always tricky especially if you are on a budget and it has to fit multitude anything that doesn't have definition.

It isn't always the process change it can also be how you access different platforms and multiple logins. Adding a wrap may add another login and system delays which make the processing element less efficient at the customer interface. Multiple legacy system Ids cannot always be automatically matched/verified easily.

At a personal level years ago, to pay in a cheque at the bank, I would hand said cheque and credit slip to cashier, they would check it and put it in a pigeon hole for processing in batches later. Now I have to wait while they process my individual transaction, even feeding the cheque through some form of reader, encoding system. Therefore the queue at the counter starts to build and I am delayed. No doubt from a bank perspective it may have improved an element of processing elsewhere.

kabayiri

I rather suspect we can flowchart *this* and see it unfold.

1) In comes new government
2) New government proclaims that the previous lot were wrong - that NHS/DWP/MOD should work like *this*
3) Sets timescale for *this* to fit in with a 5 year term, in vague attempt to stop the next lot cancelling it
4) Realises last year of office is no time for bad news to emerge from development of *this* -> reduces timescale to 4 years
5) New government is told to get requirements delivered in Year 1 / first 3 months to have any chance
6) New government delivers first draft of wrong requirements by end of Year 1
7) Year 2 - project opened up to all the stakeholders to explain *this* in all it's glory
8) All stakeholders kick off, explaining how *this* is missing a *that* ; *tother* and *someat else*
9) Scope is changed; content is changed; Suppliers look to the skies and consult their lawyers for an escape route, and to their sales force for revenue maxxing
10) ...
11) ...
12) ... some years later, a pale shadow of *this* emerges by which point, no one really works like that anyway
13) New government promises public enquiry --> Lessons WILL be learned! (honest guv)

... rinse & repeat

grizzly1911

ringo_24601 wrote: »

IT is not always much different for public or private projects

The issue with public projects is they often have artificially derived political deadlines and changes in direction

I remember working every evening and weekend for 3 weeks, just because the minister for health had put an artificial deadline on one of our projects (i.e. never actually considered who was available to work and how long the work would take)

Edit: I've also worked on an IT project where the entire thing was scrapped by Gordon Brown as one of the first things he did when he gained office as PM. Nice one Gordon, I'm glad I busted my gut on that project too.

That isn't just confined to the public sector.

Artificial deadlines created with black holes thereafter and bear no relation to the critical path, especially if someone's key milestone delivery and bonus rely on it.

EDIT:- Classic cartoon. they did miss one point - handover to BAU - hot potato time with no budget.

CLAPTON

thousands of IT projects has been scrapped, delaid, over budget in the private sector; except of course the private sector tends not to publicise it's failures.

[Deleted User]

CLAPTON wrote: »

thousands of IT projects has been scrapped, delaid, over budget in the private sector; except of course the private sector tends not to publicise it's failures.

I'd say a 3rd of my career has been spent on projects that never quite made it. It's even worse when you realise that 1/2 way through, knowing it will never happen. Yet you've got a b*tch of a Project manager yapping at you to complete testing. <goes off to grumble>

However if you check in with an touch-screen kiosk at certain London hospitals, you'll have me to thank for making it integrate with their appointment scheduling system You'd never realise I wrote most of the code whilst on the train coming back from other projects

CLAPTON

ringo_24601 wrote: »

I'd say a 3rd of my career has been spent on projects that never quite made it. It's even worse when you realise that 1/2 way through, knowing it will never happen. Yet you've got a b*tch of a Project manager yapping at you to complete testing. <goes off to grumble>

However if you check in with an touch-screen kiosk at certain London hospitals, you'll have me to thank for making it integrate with their appointment scheduling system

well done old chap.

grizzly1911

ringo_24601 wrote: »

You'd never realise I wrote most of the code whilst on the train coming back from other projects

Was this reflected in you time sheet and invoice?

[Deleted User]

grizzly1911 wrote: »

Was this reflected in you time sheet and invoice?

Of Course. I could use a project (Billable) code rather than a travel (non-billable) code. My old firm would let you bill whatever work you did on a project, to it. If you worked a 60 hour week, you popped that on your timesheet.

My current firm won't let you put down more than 40 hours, even if you work 70 (never have). On the plus side, they give you time in lieu for the extra hours (my old firm would have laughed at you). They are far more stringent on our bill-ability though.

I'm very stupid and I don't do contracting work (Wife won't let me...)

I hate filling in timesheets too

alleycat`

CLAPTON wrote: »

thousands of IT projects has been scrapped, delaid, over budget in the private sector; except of course the private sector tends not to publicise it's failures.

They are also often playing with their own or investors money.

I'm not sure i feel like i choose to invest in certain PS projects.

As to banks:

I used to work many moons ago in a "bank call centre".

The people you spoke to did all the "transaction work" on the phone via computer systems but in reality all that work then went to an "inhouse" branch that did all the real work in the background.

So when you were told something had happened, it still required more manual work usually using the scanning of bits of paper.

Ignore the man behind the curtain in all its glory.