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Lessons From a Decade of IT Failures (ieee.org)
New submitter mixed_signal writes: IEEE Spectrum has an online set of articles, or "lessons," on why big IT projects have failed, including analysis of the impacts of failed systems and the life cycles of failed projects. From the summary: "To commemorate the last decade's worth of failures, we organized and analyzed the data we've collected. We cannot claim—nor can anyone, really—to have a definitive, comprehensive database of debacles. Instead, from the incidents we have chronicled, we handpicked the most interesting and illustrative examples of big IT systems and projects gone awry and created the five interactives featured here. Each reveals different emerging patterns and lessons. Dive in to see what we've found. One big takeaway: While it's impossible to say whether IT failures are more frequent now than in the past, it does seem that the aggregate consequences are worse."
Not at my government job. A newly hired I.T. guy who expects to get paid for doing nothing because he thinks this is a "government job" will find himself on the unemployment line within a month. Most of my coworkers are ex-military who tolerate zero crap from each other. We worked very hard to provide the best services to our users despite taking abuse from the public for being government employees.
You neglected "massive government waste who cares it isn't really my money being spent."
Actually, the Spectrum article says the opposite. The private sector wastes just as much money, and manages just as badly, as the government.
The "Software Hall of Shame" includes
http://spectrum.ieee.org/compu...
large companies and small; in commercial, nonprofit, and governmental organizations.
I think free-market ideologues should read less Ayn Rand and more IEEE Spectrum. And pay less attention to right-wing theories and more attention to what actually happens in the real world.
You ought to meet some government employees, as I did, who would rather serve their country than make a lot of money, corny as it sounds.
I found a lot of people like that in the military health care system.
I met a 60-year-old doctor who gave up a practice that was probably paying ~$300,000 a year to join the military and treat Marines in Iraq who had their feet blown off by land mines.
I met VA doctors who were really dedicated to cure patients with cancer and heart disease, or at least keep them alive and functioning as long as possible.
Of course, as Paul Krugman says, if the Republicans want to destroy government, in order to prove government never works, they can cause a lot of harm to their country and sometimes succeed. (Not that centerist Democrats are much better.)