Damien Katz

Couldn't agree more. Essentially, it is the client's execs that fumbled the ball here. Having said that, nothing Tristan says is untrue, you know. I once worked for a sub, that's how the business goes...

Two addtional comments...

First, this is nothing new and nothing unique to IBM. All the big consulting and IT services firms do exactly the same thing. Years ago I heard the expression "The Andersen Schoolbus" referring to the fact that if you hired Andersen Consulting they would roll in a busload of kids with almost no individual experience, but a high bill-rate justified by Andersen's corporate name.

Second, this sounds like a very typical "Big Bang" or "Grand Plan" IT project that is initiated without first doing a small scale but realistic proof of concept pilot. Just about every portal project I've ever heard of falls into this category, and the best thing that ever happens is that it it succeeds in a limited scope but with massive cost over-runs. More often, it's a total failure... and the only difference between the two outcomes is whether or not the managers with a personal stake in the process recognize the impending doom and bail out before everyone else does, or are so clueless that they stick around and then throw money at it in an attempt to save their reputations and jobs.

Richard,

Why would the managers need to save their reputations?

It's been my experience that in this kind of environment, such bad managers are kept on because they "now know how to handle difficult situations, even when it seems that all is failure".

Or in others words, they can paint pigshit gold and then use a combination of blame diversion and distraction to get out of the hole they're in...

The Dilbert Principle must be strong at that place!

I should have said the middle managers.

As a native of Washington, DC I must say that I am shocked, shocked to discover that there is incompentence and waste in the world of IT contracting!

Well maybe not too shocked, considering I recently made similar observations blogging about what I call the " ">Incompentence Paradox".


I've also heard the same Anderson Consulting stories from several folks that were there, but it would be great to see a more comprehensive cataloging of all these misdeeds.

I am often surprised that some companies will hire a large consulting firm in favour of individual contractors or small consulting companies.

On numerous times I have seen that the large consultancy then goes out hires a contractor, who sometimes has only very basic skills. What does the client get ? For a start they pay a large premium over what they could have got the contractor for in the first place. And what about the longevity ? Well yes, the consulting company will be around in the future but the person who they contracted, and who actually did the work, may not be around. So what happens when you want updates to your system. Well the consulting company goes an hires another contractor who you then pay to get up to speed on your system, at a highly inflated price of course.




Why not just hire highly-skilled independent contractors in the first place ?

Ethann,

Joel Spolsky answers your question pretty well here:
http://www.joelonsoftware.com/articles/fog0000000024.html

Take what he says, and now add the factors of Risk and Reputation. The small lone contractor has no backup. If he or she is hit by a bus tomorrow, you're screwed. IBM/Anderson/KPMG/MegaCorp has thousands of drones, and a manual. They can parachute someone in when the bus makes a rorschach pattern out of your consultant.

So, the management picks established players because they're less risk to project completion - even though they're probably a higher risk to project success.

Wow. Suddenly I sound like an MBA or something... ;-)

I thought a view from the other side might be a nice addition. I am an MBA and have worked in IT consulting for several years at a couple of the previously mentioned companies. I have seen many different projects and some have been good and others have been called "successes" by the client executive but truly, it was far less than a success in my book. To many of your points regarding young workers and subcontractors you are correct. I would point out that in most cases consulting firms are brought complete a task where the skills do not exist within the company. So I believe that in saying why does the company just hire an experienced contractor to complete the task you are not looking at the whole picture. Usually, these projects are large and have a team of several people. In most cases an experienced manager and some senior technical people. Then you will also have a mix of subcontractors and your younger consultants. There roles are different, in many cases they do a lot of the grunt work if you will and usually bill at a much lower rate than your senior people or management. I agree with you that there is probably not a perfect consulting company or model out there but I have been involved with enough good projects to say that I do believe in the value of consulting.