The following are case studies of contract disputes in which Ashby Bachmann were able to find successful resolution for its clients. Situation Assessment & Rectification A Canadian division of world-wide leader in the image processing field had the global mandate to develop new digital technology to revolutionise a huge specialty marketplace. It had contracted with … Read more
Ashby Bachmann Inc. has been reporting on this phenomenon for more than thirty years, citing public and private-sector research, from Gartner, Auditors General across Canada and around the globe, and experience in our own practice.In 2018, the McKinsey Center for Government did a survey of 3,000 public officials across 18 countries and found that 80 per cent of … Read more
Don’t wait for a heart attack! The risk factors are well known and the precautions are safe and inexpensive. Proper prevention involves both a change of habits – and regular checkups. We know what to do but we still don’t do it. IT projects are well-known for having failure rates of more than 50%…80% of … Read more
Celebrate Success Projects are hard work – for the whole organization. Total successes are genuinely rare. Even partial successes are worth celebrating – and learning from. As with each preceding step to project success, the aegis for the celebration should be the CEO. The project sponsor’s superior, if not the CEO, should consider making the … Read more
In Step#3 we emphasised the importance of a firm procedural foundation to successful projects. No foundation stone is more important than the inputs and outputs associated with Steering Committee over-sight. The documents should include, as a minimum; an issues log, a register of requirements changes and a continuous and comprehensive list of budget and timetable … Read more
Nothing better emphasises the corporate imperative of a major undertaking than the personal endorsement of the CEO. While the project sponsor, and indeed the primary beneficiary, may be lower down the corporate ladder, the imprimatur of the CEO at the launch of the activity will do more to ensure success than any subsequent communication. The … Read more
Validate the revised plan and re-affirm Business commitment Whether the business solution envisaged is to be developed in-house or via a third party, the process you have been through should have resulted in a revised plan, somewhat different from the original one evaluated in Step #3. If the plan is NOT different, you clearly do … Read more
Validate the RFP & Selection Process Bias, conscious or unconscious, is inherent in all of us, and in every decision that we make. Even our decisions to become better informed about a topic are effected by our biases. The places we seek information and the sources we use reflect those biases, so it’s hard to … Read more
Ensure an informed sign-off of the requirements definition You might suppose that this step was added to round out the steps to ten. Surely the user knows what is required, or the project would not have been approved, planned and funded. But a lot happens between concept and definition. At the time of writing this … Read more
Other than the failure to properly implement Change Management, probably the second-most systemic reason for IT project failures is the reluctance to institute and perform a checkpoint. Every major PM methodology subscribes to this process. Sometimes called stage-gate, or interim reviews, these are specific activities, not just a date on the project plan. A checkpoint … Read more