Survivor's Guide To IT Hell

Description

Here is the real story of IT failures - an insider's view of the many problems and how to avoid them. It is sad that a lot of very bright, capable people continue to get it very badly wrong. There have been the scandals of the Criminal Records Bureau, the fiasco of the Air Traffic Control System and the Immigration system to name just a few. These cock-ups are just the tip of the iceberg. Behind the closed doors of the commercial world, many more have gone pear-shaped. The aim of this important book is to help decision makers and those who analyse and commentate on these matters to understand what really goes on at the heart of a big IT development. It is not a formal treatise on project management techniques - rather it lifts the lid on the inner workings of the process, points out where the problems lie and what can be done to avoid the biggest pitfalls. It is not the management systems themselves that break down but the 'people' element - confusion, politicking, vanity, poor communications - and stupidity and laziness.


Contents:

Introduction
The systyems
The parties
Why do IT projects at all
Feasibility study
Benchmarking
Business case
Setting up the project team
Project management
System requirements
Tendering
Tender adjudication
The contract
Design & development phase
Reference data
Interfaces to other systems
Management information
Training
Ergonomics
Migration
Communications
Testing
Getting ready for going live
Going live...or maybe not?
Getting the system to work properly
Support & maintenance
Documentation
Organisational culture
Human factors
Rescoping
Risks
Programmes
What if it all goes tits-up
Bringing it all together
Commplete contents list