Dear Customer: The Truth About IT Projects

There really isn’t a nice, simple solution to any of this. We can't solve this problem for you. We need you, but you have to work with us. As the customer, you have to be prepared to work with us, the supplier, again and again in order to reduce the risk.  Addressing risks in a timely and cost effective manor involving business level decisions and trade-offs.  If you aren’t there to help, we can either make the decision for you (adding the risk that you disagree) or we will spend your time and money to address it.

You need to be prepared to accept and share the risk with us. If you aren’t prepared to take on any risk, we will charge you a lot for all the risk we take on.

Sharing the risk has the effect of reducing the risk, because once the risk is shared you, the customer, are motivated to reduce risk.  One of the major risks on IT projects is a lack of customer involvement. You can help with that just by staying involved.

Ultimately all risk is your risk. You are the customer and you are paying for this project, one way or the other. If it fails to deliver value, it is your business that will suffer. When you share risks and are closely involved in this process, risks can be addressed immediately rather than being allowed to fester and grow.

Finally, you may have grand ambitions, but we need to work in small chunks. I know this may not sound very sexy, but software creation works best when small. Economies of scale don't exist. In fact, we have diseconomies of scale, so we need to work in tiny pieces again, again, and again. If you are prepared to accept these suggestions, then let’s press reset on our relationship and talk some more.

Yours sincerely,
The IT Industry