[mgkimsal]

you're both right, but you're a bit more right. IBM should have been pointing out that losing the institutional knowledge may cause problems. they possibly assumed some of their milestones and deliverables would be while working with existing staff. if the existing staff is let go, many of the assumptions in the original estimate are just wrong at that point.

[rgbrenner]

The managers needed IBM to tell them about the concept of institutional knowledge? They need to be told that people with experience have learned their jobs? That new employees need training? This is like Management 101. Just how incompetent are these managers?

[hinkley]

So incompetent they hired someone else to write software only they could possibly know how to write.

There is a degree of management bankruptcy implicit in a large proportion of outsourcing projects. Hiring a vendor to handle billing for your public records dept makes sense, because you can’t afford to maintain a stable of experts on billing.

But a lot of the skill brought in by good contracing firms is in extracting and negotiating requirements. Because your management team has no idea how the work actually gets done.

Think about that. It is cheaper to have some other company come in and learn your problem domain than it is for your company to write down clearly what it is they do and figure out a set of steps to attract employees to do the work for them.

Personally, I think that has Management 101 written all over it in large block letters.

[mgkimsal]

Haven't read the docs, so I don't know what the contracts and proposals states, but regardless of how obvious some things are, putting that in writing is a bit of a CYA.

"We're estimating based on having access and participation from your senior/experiences payroll employees. Substantial changes in personnel will impact the viability of the project."

[itronitron]

The competent managers likely had no say in the matter.

[bobdole1234]

That's a trick question, there are no competent managers in government service for the most part. They either burn out from managing without the ability to recruit competent staff, or they moved elsewhere to make drastically more money.

I'm sitting with a 4x multiple on my old public service job.

[Retra]

They're the ones spending the money. It's not "oh, we're getting paid? Caveat emptor." Everyone involved has a social responsibility, but the ones who are getting paid to be there have more responsibility.

[itronitron]

Yeah, with that price tag IBM could have rolled out multiple federated payroll systems and then iterated on the theme until they had a unified system, but they would not have been able to farm out the development to off-site contractors.