The Standish Group’s Chaos Report says that only 29 percent of IT projects succeed while 19 percent are considered utter failures. The biggest mistake IT leaders can make is sticking with the status quote due to a fear of failure, according to Christian Thun, VP at Agiloft.
A system change can be very expensive and risky because there could be serious complications. Over time business applications such as HRM, CRM, or CLM systems deployed in an enterprise organization develop increasingly complex interconnections. This makes the maintenance and deployment of changes in business applications highly complex, resource intensive, and painfully slow. The solution? Low-code/no-code platforms that makes the transformation easy.
To learn more, Digital Journal spoke with Christian Thun about what IT departments can do to set themselves up for success in 2020.
Digital Journal: How many IT projects typically succeed?
Christian Thun: Most IT software project are not successful. The Standish Group’s “Chaos Report” asserts that only 29% of IT projects succeed while 19% are considered complete failures. Even more alarming is a McKinsey Insights report that 17% of large IT projects are executed so poorly that they threaten the very existence of the company.
DJ: What are the reasons for failure?
Thun: Failure is often attributed to projects that exceeded the projected budget or time-frame, were not accepted by the users, failed to meet business objectives, or failed to function throughout their planned lifespans without major incidents or incurring significant, unplanned cost.
When an IT department first purchases an application, it fits their use case. But as the business climate evolves, the software may no longer support their business needs. It can cost millions of dollars to modify or modernize, as often dedicated software development is required to modify the application, and it soon becomes a time-intensive and costly project.
DJ: Why do some projects become so complicated?
Thun:A system change can be very expensive and risky because serious complications can occur. Over time, business applications such as HRM, CRM, or CLM systems deployed in an enterprise organization develop increasingly complex interconnections. This makes the maintenance and deployment of changes in business applications highly complex, resource intensive, and painfully slow. When custom coding is involved, it introduces a significant level of risk as well as custom bugs. Over the lifespan of a large project, the typical ratio of costs for bug-fixing or maintenance compared to initial development is 4:1. If custom coding cannot be avoided, set expectations that the project may take much longer than expected, and budget for ongoing maintenance costs.
DJ: What are the reasons for IT project success?
Thun:IT projects are successful when delivered on-time, within budget, and deliver enterprise-wide value. Many business leaders and IT professionals face an uphill battle when trying to complete successful IT projects. Working with a vendor that guarantees their work mitigates the risks of implementing automated software. This type of guarantee is rare but worth seeking out as it can defend against today’s risk of IT project failure. At Agiloft, we offer our customers a 100% satisfaction guarantee on both the software licenses and services. If a customer is not satisfied with the results or wants to cancel for any reason within 90 days of purchase, they pay nothing. Over 27 years and thousands of implementations, the guarantee has only been invoked four times.
DJ: How much of this is down to using low-code / no code platforms?
Thun:In recent years, no-code application development platforms have emerged that promise to significantly reduce the cost of changes to the IT infrastructure. No-code is the next stage in the evolution of platforms, and no-code provides a material advantage over even low-code platforms, which often require a large amount of coding to configure and maintain. IT departments can set themselves up for success by adopting a no-code platform that allows them to easily adapt to a changing business climate. Replacing legacy applications with no-code environments provides more long-term benefits, reduces costs, and eliminates the burden of ongoing maintenance of the application.
No-code platforms are useful because applications can be configured faster, at significantly reduced risk, resource, and time requirements. Application administrators can implement changes that previously required standalone software development projects. This can eliminate millions of dollars and years of application development as well as costs associated with modifications down the road.
