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contracts using technology, many
work well. However, the most expensive and complex programs are often train wrecks.
A bit of advice
Recognize that 80 percent of promising technologies, always highly touted by the media, never reach critical mass usage and fade into oblivion, to be remembered only by the few technology historians.
Politicians and your colleagues will often rush to seek a technology-based solution for
a tough political problem. Sometimes they are right to do
so, but more often than not, ballyhooed technology solutions collapse in a few years, sometimes at great expense to the taxpayer. As a program manager, you must determine whether the technology
proposed to you is mature or not. There are several sources, including Gartner and Bill Halal’s TechCast, that can help you determine whether the touted technology class is ready to meet your requirements.
In addition to being skeptical, check with sources in other governments domestically and worldwide to see if technology that your colleagues or contractors are proposing has worked successfully in any sector. See if it worked, not whether there is a plan. Existence of a plan is not a good barometer of future success.
The CIO Council in the federal government, the National Association of State CIOs for state governments in the United States, and the International Council
for Information Technology in Government Administration are
sources of information about what works and what does not.
Even a failed project may serve two purposes:
• It allows political appointees and elected officials to demonstrate that they recognized a problem and took action.
• It can reveal to government
and industry officials how the technology needs to improve to meet a vital, current requirement.
So do not fear failure, but take your chances in a pilot program — not the entire program where the costs of failure will be extravagant.
Question advice and resist pressure to use new technology as the first and best solution to any problem. And if you do engage in technology hype, be sure to keep your résumé up-to-date and make tracks to another job before reality sets in. n
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