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Why IT and the real world really don’t mix

Picture credit: wallyg

Picture credit: wallyg

Bryan Glick has blogged about Why IT and the real world don’t mix  Bryan’s piece looks at a review of  the Integrated Childrens System (ICS) and makes the usual observations about IT projects. But I say the real reason that IT and the real world don’t mix is because there is no logical point of direct interface between IT and the real world.

Of course, that doesn’t stop most people from continually trying to batter IT into the real world, instead of recognising that technology should always engage indirectly with the real world, as an important contributor to information systems.

Why do so-called “IT projects” fail? Because they are wrongly established from the outset and lack the necessary mix of people, process and technology. So I would strongly suggest that the ICS case study should not focus on the integrated/ centralised IT debate but concentrate on learning how to constitute effective information systems.

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  • http://www.golitopia.com Oli Rhys

    Getting IT and the real world to mix flawlessly is really the next challenge.
    Personally, I tend to think that the main reason for the problem is that the drivers and incentives for the projects are not aligned.

    Its very similar to government projects in general – the idea comes from one place, the money from elsewhere, and the builders from a third source. The users are never consulted and the success indicators are never connected to each other!

    Maybe we need to look at the problem from the end user’s point of view – but that might expose something of a taboo which is that many IT projects are built for the wrong reasons – it is no wonder that they fail!

    • http://www.colin-beveridge.com Colin Beveridge

      Oli

      My perspective is that we need to stop trying to align technology and strategy directly, that approach too often fails because it loses sight of key, systematic essentials.

      IT is an important part of an effective information system but should not be the senior component in the configuration.