Jawed’s Blog

I was reading an article about why projects fail and found interesting points and the following list has been inspired by actual mistakes encountered in real-world systems projects.

1. Don’t use a specific methodology because coding is all that is really important.
2. Create the project plan by working backwards from a drop-dead system completion date.
3. Don’t bother with a data model. Just build whatever tables you need.
4. Use a Technical Lead that has never built a similar system. Hiring such talent is too expensive.
5. Hire forty developers to make the coding go faster.
6. Selecting wrong tools and technologies for development
7. Three months before the system goes live, assign one junior developer to handle the data migration.
8. Skip the testing phase because the project is way behind schedule.
9. Change the system to support critical new requirements discovered during final development.
10. Buy a commercial, off-the-shelf package and customize it… a lot.

Read full article @ allpurposearticles.com.

One of my friend send me an email about how communication goes with in a company when new project proposal is under review. It is wonderful and depicts exactly what people at different level think about a new project, their company is biding for:

Programmer to Team Leader:

• We can’t do this proposed project.
• It will involve major design change and no one in our team knows the design of this legacy system.
• And above that, nobody in our company knows the language in which this application has been written.
• So even if somebody wants to work on it, they can’t. If you ask my personal opinion, the company should never take these types of projects.

Team Leader to Project Manager:

• This project will involve a design change.
• Currently, we don’t have any staff that has experience in this type of work.
• Also, the language is unfamiliar to us, so we will have to arrange for some training if we take this project.
• In my personal opinion, we are not ready to take on a project of this nature.

Project Manager to 1st Level Manager:

• This project involves a design change in the system.
• We don’t have much experience in that area.
• Also, not many people in our company are appropriately trained for it.
• In my personal opinion, we might be able to do the project but we would need more time than usual to complete it.

1st Level Manager to Senior Level Manager:

• This project involves design re-engineering.
• We have some people who have worked in this area and others who know the implementation language. So they can train other people.
• In my personal opinion we should take this project, but with caution.

Senior Level Manager to CEO:

• This project will demonstrate to the industry our capabilities in remodeling the design of a complete legacy system.
• We have all the necessary skills and people to execute this project successfully.
• Some people have already given in house training in this area to other staff members.
• In my personal opinion, we should not let this project slip by us under any circumstances.

CEO to Client:

• This is the type of project in which our company specializes. We have executed many projects of the same nature for many large clients.
• Trust me when I say that we are the most competent firm in the industry for doing this kind of work. It is my personal opinion that we can execute this project successfully and well within the given time frame.