Some stats:
- 46% of failed (canceled or over budget) IT projects can be avoided it IT project baselines are more realistic
Source: Price Survey Responses, 2006, Price Systems. Price Systems builds cost estimating and forecasting tools.
What is even more interesting from their survey is the reasons for the IT project problems:
- Poor project management - 61%
- Scope creep - 54%
- Lack of proper baseline - 43%
- Late understanding of risk - 37%
Each of these is a Project Management problem.
Direct Experience from the Field
When we come across troubled projects, the questions used to "turn on the lights," start with the project Breathalyzer test:
- Is there a current and credible network of project activities?
- Is the current and credible schedule and budget for these activities?
- Do you know who is responsible for delivering the software?
- Do you know the current top 10 risks to delivering this software?
- Do you know the compression of the current schedule?
- Do you the estimated size of the software in some reliable units of measure?
- What is the percentage of software not under your control?
- Do you have the right staff to deliver this software?
- Do they have the proper expertise?
- Can the staff be available at the right time?
If you can't answer these in the affirmative - No software delivery methodology is going to save you from failure. Period, full stop, end of conversation.
These are fundamental project attributes
You have to fix these first, then the favorite methodology can be applied to the development of the code, management of the teams, or what ever other problem the method claims to solve.
