IT Project failure: can we blame the techies?

The business commentators have noticed: IT is not giving most businesses the benefits they claim IT should.   The projects themselves bring change that the businesses and their people aren’t handling properly.  IT projects lock wasteful practices into new systems. The dream and the promises have been broken.

It is so easy to throw stones at IT people.

Adoption of technology curve

The adoption of technology has a curve: leading edge, fast followers, a drop off where some of the fast followers become disillusioned, the technology matures and around 80% of the market place suddenly appears, before a decline as the world moves on.

This curve was documented by EW Rodgers, you may find his book (and one by Paul Sloane) interesting.

It is so easy for leaders or fast followers to forget they are in that role until the mass market catches them up and they feel like they are repeating themselves.

I think Customer Relationship Management (CRM) software is reaching the mass market.  Many organisations have tried it over the last few years – unfortunately, not always successfully.

Speed of Change in Business Systems

Business systems are the systems that help an organisation run: software like ERP (Enterprise Resource Management) to do the accounting and CRM (Customer Relationship Management) to support contact with customer.  Like every other technology, they change surprisingly quickly. Most suppliers of these systems launch major updates every 9 to 18 months.