Brian Kennemer has extensively commented on the PM 2.0 post of his experience of including cost in number in projects he is familiar with. This trigger my thinking on what the real problem is with many IT projects.
It comes down to a fundamental principle of any business, from running IT maintenance to flying to low earth orbit with 3 astronauts on board.
If you don't know the cost of something
You can't know its value
This is fundamental to every activity of every business process, including IT. It is also a fundamental failure mode of many IT departments.
When a CIO is asked "why are you here and why should I keep you here?" The answer better be, "because I provide X$'s of value contribution to this organization."
Value is derived from cost for every product or service effort ever developed or performed.
