PROJECT MANAGEMENT

Project Management

Project Management

Task 1: Research IT Project Failures

Digital Trunked Radio System Failures

August 17th, 2009 - Only a small percentage of problems with Digital Trunked Radio System Failures are reported by the news media, however there are a sufficient number of stories to establish reasonable doubt as to the suitability of these systems. In fact, there is a clear pattern that would cause a reasonable and prudent person to entertain a strong and honest suspicion as to the suitability of this technology for mission-critical public safety radio communication (Baker, 1997: 25).



LSE Breaks Down Biggest Failure in 8 Years

London Stock Exchange Group Plc, operator of the world's fourth-largest market, broke down on the day European equities posted their biggest gain in five months, hurting clients who trade an average $17.5 billion a day. Trading resumed at 4 p.m. after an earlier computer failure left clients unable to buy or sell shares for about seven hours, according to the LSE's Web site. About 352 million shares, worth $2.5 billion, changed hands in the first hour of trading before the halt, more than twice the amount in the same period a week ago, sending the FTSE-100 index up as much as 3.8 percent (Baker, 1997: 26). The breakdown left traders in Europe's financial capital in limbo as equities around the world rallied on the U.S. government's takeover of mortgage lenders Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. The LSE, Europe's oldest independent exchange, said attempts to fix its biggest computer failure in more than eight years took ``longer than expected.''

Overstock.com's 4 Year ERP Nightmare

Looking back through its short history, it appears that the ERP implementation has been nothing but trouble. The strife started in 2005. That's when Byrne's "my bad" mea culpa over the $14.2 million loss was further exacerbated by a customer service meltdown related to the hurried Oracle ERP rollout. "I bit off more technology projects than my colleagues could chew, Byrne told investors at the time. "The last bite, an ERP implementation, was one bite too many, and we choked on it. Overstock's transition from a homegrown ERP package to the new Oracle system, which was rushed to completion before the 2005 holiday shopping season, left it unable to tell customers the status of their orders or to provide any shipping information, reported The Register's Ashlee Vance in late October 2005. The result: Overstock.com's customer tracking systems were down for nearly a week. In total, Vance added, "it's a shocking display for a supposed Internet-savvy retailer meant to compete with the likes of Amazon.com and eBay.

Task 2: Project Management Review

There is one important question asked in today's world regardless of the sector in which the organizations are present in. Why do projects fail and how do we prevent them from failing. It is important to understand and analyze these questions as it will help organizations improve their reputation which will in turn attract more jobs from customers (Jiang & Joseph, 1996: 49). There are some periods of time where it is sometimes ...