IT in the UK public sector is under intense scrutiny and needs to deliver better results: much investment has been made which has too often failed to deliver. Projects have a history of being protracted and complex, offering significant challenges to all involved.
BUSINESS INSIGHTS June 2006 Helping find the way to better public sector IT Contacts: IT in the UK public sector is under intense scrutiny and needs to deliver better results: much Elaine Axby investment has been made which has too often failed to deliver. Projects have a history of Quocirca Ltd being protracted and complex, offering significant challenges to all involved. The questions Tel +44 20 8874 7442 being asked are: has the government lost its way? does it really know how to obtain success elaine.axby@quocirca.com from these big projects? This paper looks at the challenges posed by public sector IT and suggests better ways of managing these projects to deliver benefits quickly. Clive Longbottom Quocirca Ltd Executive summary Tel +44 1189 483 360 clive.longbottom@quocirca.com . Government IT is challenging: projects are high profile; public sector organisations are risk-adverse; the scale is huge with frequently changing demands of departments and agencies; there are legacy systems, different applications and many, often inconsistent, sources of data which are hard to discover and difficult to bring into new applications . Across all parts of the public sector, pressure is increasing to bring together different IT systems and different data sources to develop pan-department services which provide maximum benefits for the citizen whilst enabling working practices to be more efficient. Here, re-use of existing systems and timely access to accurate data is of the essence. . However, government IT has a poor track record. Too much money is wasted on complex projects which fail to deliver the anticipated benefits. The political objective to have consistent services delivered locally across the country with centralised reporting requirements, and (often) frequent changes in requirements, means that at present neither citizens nor public sector employees are sufficiently engaged in the process, with the result that big projects often fail to deliver the expected benefits. REPORT NOTE: . In IT, the fact that technology changes is a given - but much already exists to solve This report has been written these problems and if used properly, can enable government to take a more staged independently by Quocirca approach to IT developments, using standardised interfaces which enable the easy Ltd to address certain issues integration of legacy systems, delivering quick wins and a roadmap to service found in today's public transformation. The challenge is managing this to deliver best value. sector organisations. The report draws on Quocirca's . Government urgently needs to re-assess its approach to large-scale IT projects. It extensive knowledge of the needs to understand technology better to be able to talk more openly to suppliers. It technology and business needs to better understand the way risk is handled and that if project risk is totally arenas, and provides advice passed to suppliers, then this will have a cost attached and will not necessarily on the approach that deliver the benefits sought. In the long term, passing all of the risk to the supplier organisations should take to create a more effective and may lead to a vicious circle in which trust is lost between customer and supplier and efficient environment for all projects are carried out in a confrontational atmosphere. future growth. . Government also needs to improve its approach to project organisation: the fact that During the preparation of procurement cycles are so long means that the business issues and available this report, Quocirca has spoken to a number of technologies have often changed by the time the project starts, hence a further suppliers and customers reduced chance of success. To improve the situation, a detailed, upfront project involved in public sector IT strategy is required to assess the strategic choices available and make sure that they projects. We are grateful for still meet the business' needs over time. their time and insights into this market. . The other major change in project management needed is to take a more modular approach; structuring the project into manageable chunks with shorter timescales and quicker deliverables. Such an approach should al... [download for more]
