Terry Keefe et al.
4. Observations, recommendations and concluding remarks
Project success and failure are topics of a huge amount of discussion, especially in relation to e‐Government. Among IT Project Management experts there is a general agreement on the criticality of having a set of clear, defined and agreed aims and objectives before commencing any detailed form of project planning, let alone going ahead with the project e. g.( Cadle & Yeats, 2008)( Highsmith, 2010)( Marchewka, 2013).
4.1 Observations
As discussed earlier, e‐Government projects are high risk in that they focus on innovation, have a high degree of complexity, and often have multiple objectives. Many particularly in the EU, are started as research activities with participants who are not clear what they want to achieve. As a result many do not deliver success, at least for some of their participants( EUROPEAN COURT OF AUDITORS, 2011). This is of course the case for other research areas but it is particularly relevant to e‐Government where the funding pressures are very restrictive and the types of partner organisations very diverse. When we look at iSAC6 case study we find all three aspects are present. Clearly iSAC6 cannot be held up in comparison to the huge range of diverse and immensely larger e‐Government projects. However there are lessons which would be of value to many project managers and sponsors, particularly within the EU.
ISAC6 has been highly successful in meeting its core objectives, and as a consequence is set to expand and build upon that success. The factors forming the keys to this success are:
• The project has had a clear and consistent focus upon improving a standard but very important government process, providing information to citizens. In this instance the focus was made more precise by piloting it among municipal authorities with a relatively high degree of commonality.
• The implementation project built upon an innovative but proven technology which had been refined within a pilot location.
• The strategic aim was clearly defined and elaborated by setting a number of strategic objectives supported by a monitoring and measurement mechanism. This ensured that success was defined as quantifiable outcomes, not just good intentions.
• The inclusion of expert partners able to take on the research, technical development and creation of management frameworks meant that the pilots were able to concentrate on developing and managing the CAS business process.
While it would be inaccurate to say iSAC6 generated any failures, it is clear from the comments in the Project reports and an examination of the history of the project that the project was for a few participants not as productive as they hoped for. The factors which are worth noting are:
• Some partners engaged in the project in a way which implied they saw it as a research or feasibility activity rather than implementation. Consequently these partners found it difficult to frame objectives and measures aimed at specifying value and benefit achievement. For two of the partners this reduced the value they received from participation but was not entirely neutral. For Pilot 6, the regional Police force it was a fatal problem in that in the absence of clear objectives and expected benefits they were unable to justify continued commitment of resources and were forced to pull out.
• The process of establishing a collaborative project which could successfully bid for EU or other public funding invariably contains a political dimension whereby it is necessary to ensure the consortium is appropriately balanced. There are good reasons for this requirement but the outcome is that it decreases the likelihood of having a single shared set of project objectives. For iSAC6 this was only a real problem at the formation stage of the project and was recognised as a risk by the large UK city authority which pulled out as a result. Other projects, as discussed elsewhere, have not been so fortunate and found themselves in serious difficulties as a result.
4.2 Considerations for further research and action
One case study, no matter how successful, is clearly not a sufficient basis for recommending changes in the practice of IT Project Management of e‐Government projects. We do make some recommendations below with regard to good practice, and raise some questions about the way in which projects are initiated. We believe the iSAC6 case study does provide sufficient support to our observations to suggest that more
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