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One Expert Pegs Yearly Cost of IT Failure At $6.2 Trillion

blognoggle writes "Roger Sessions, a noted author and expert on complexity, developed a model for calculating the total global cost of IT failure. Roger describes his approach in a white paper titled The IT Complexity Crisis: Danger and Opportunity. He concludes that IT failure costs the global economy a staggering $6.2 trillion per year."

4 of 242 comments (clear)

  1. Re:incompetence by ta+bu+shi+da+yu · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I'd look at it differently. I would firstly work out exactly how much money is generated through effective IT services and projects, and then I'd work out how much money is saved through effective IT services and projects, and then work out how much is lost through projects that go wrong. I think this sort of analysis would give a more true picture of the benefits and risks of IT projects.

    --
    XML is like violence. If it doesn't solve the problem, use more.
  2. Asleep at the Switch by professorguy · · Score: 5, Insightful

    So let me get this straight... You spend a dollar trying to improve your business process. It doesn't work out. So you're out a dollar. I get it. But then you're out a further $10 because if it HAD worked out, that's what you WOULD have saved. Puh-lease. That's assuming your idea was worth a fuck. NOT ALL IDEAS ARE.

    I can easily prove that you personally have lost millions of dollars because there were plenty of things you COULD have done to earn those millions. Why didn't you start a search engine? Why didn't you write the twitter application? Not skilled enough? Heck, you should have bought that winning lottery ticket! And while we're at it, why did you waste your money on fixing your car when it just got wrecked a month later?

    My god, you've cost yourself millions of dollars due to your incompetence!

  3. Re:incompetence by ozmanjusri · · Score: 5, Insightful
    Company, Annual turnover, $mln. 2004
    1. Symantec 1364
    2. McAfee (NAI) 597
    3. Trend Micro 508

    Which OS is costing this?

    Which company just blocked the best efforts of the rest of the world to develop an interoperable set of document formats?

    Microsoft has repeatedly prevented progress in computing. the opportunity costs of that alone are incalculable.

    --
    "I've got more toys than Teruhisa Kitahara."
  4. Re:incompetence by Nerdposeur · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Also, this happens too often:

    Manager: We need to add Feature Y.
    Coder: But that builds on Feature X, which is still buggy.
    Manager: I don't care. The customer wants it.
    ---
    (A month later)
    Coder: Can we take some time to fix the bugs in Feature X and Y?
    Manager: No, we have to make Feature Z, which builds on X and Y. We can fix them later.
    Coder: If we'd known you wanted Feature Z, we would have done X and Y completely differently.
    Manager: Hmmm. Well, it needs to work by next Tuesday.
    Coder: (very quiet expletive)