I'm picking up five-by-five signals - that's "loud and clear" in radio speak -- that the Veterans Affairs Department's $600 million financial and asset management system may never take wing.
Although VA, according to the Government Accountability Office () has already spent $90 million on the Financial and Logistics Integrated Technology Enterprise program -- mostly for program management support -- I hear that top managers and some folks on the Hill would like to see the project go away.
If it does, this will be the second VA financial management program not able to get off the ground this decade. VA's first attempt at an integrated financial management system, the $472 million Core Financial and Logistics System, was killed after it failed miserably in its initial deployment at a VA hospital in Bay Pines, Fla.
Maybe VA should try a bite-sized approach to financial management, instead of trying to develop one humongous system.
COMMENTS
You are absolutely right. I have been in software development and have a Masters in computer system management since I retired from the Navy over 20 years ago. The bigger the project is the more likely it is to fail or not meet its objective. The best approach is to break it into some pieces to solve specific problems, develop them with an eye to later integration. It may take longer and may cost more but doesn’t fail as often.
I really like your column. You make sense. Well most of the time. The mark of an intelligent man is how closely he agrees with you.
Ray Rathburn 01/25/10 09:36 am ET
Bob,
This is no surprise. It's the culture of the VA. No amount of money will ever fix that.
The question is: What happens when "strike three" arrives? I'll go ahead and answer: Not a thing.
v/r
phil
Phil 01/25/10 08:45 am ET
As Einstein would comments on this; "insanity is defined as continuing the same process and expecting different results" . VA suffers from the same ERP failure patterns as DoD, mainly because they continue to apply big name but ineffective processes and consulting resources.
Maybe VA needs to conduct a root cause analysis, and stop investing in those processes and resources that have been part of past failures. Big names do not equal success, in fact, just the opposite.
In DoD, there is a 100% correlation between major IT program failures and the FFRDC developed processes they have used over 20 years. This why congress has directed a complete replacement of its IT architecture and acquisition processes in this years National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA Sec 804). Maybe VA needs to do the same. If its broke, fix it.
IT AAC 01/25/10 08:00 am ET