11 ‘Laws of IT Physics’ | IT Leadership | TechRepublic.

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11 ‘Laws of IT Physics’
● Date: November 21st, 2008
● Author: Michael Krigsman
● Category: Project Management
● Tags: Project, Information Technology, Planning, Strategy, Management, Michael Krigsman
●

During testimony before Congress, Norm V. Brown presented what he calls “Laws of IT
Physics.” These “Laws” highlight hidden pitfalls the hurt many projects and help explain why
some projects succeed while others fail.

—————————————————————————————————————

This is a guest post from Michael Krigsman of TechRepublic’s sister site ZDNet. You can follow
Michael on his ZDNet blog IT Project Failures, or subscribe to the RSS feed.

Given high rates of failed IT projects, it’s helpful to examine first principles that underlie
successful technology deployments. Even though devils live in the details, understanding basic
dynamics behind successful project setup, execution, and management is important.

During testimony before Congress, in a hearing titled “The Dismal State of Federal Information
Technology Planning,” Norm V. Brown, Executive Director of the Center for Program
Transformation, an IT failures think tank, presented what he calls “Laws of IT PhysicsTM.”

These “Laws” highlight hidden pitfalls the hurt many projects, and help explain why some
projects succeed while others fail. They recognize that successful IT project delivery is primarily
about managing people, process, and deliverables. Yes, technology is important, but the people
side comes first. Here’s the list, with slight editing:

1. Planning is a continuous process, not a one-time event. A Project Plan

cannot survive past contract award and must continually change based on actual
experience (requirement additions or modifications count as actual experience).

This is the silent killer! Lewis Cardin, senior project portfolio management analyst at Forrester
Research, calls this “first number syndrome,” where senior management becomes tied to initial
estimates and refuses to accept change.

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 11 ‘Laws of IT Physics’ | IT Leadership | TechRepublic.com

● Related: ‘Debunking IT Project Failure Myths’ [podcast]

It’s completely unreasonable not to expect that lengthy projects will evolve over time. Change
isn’t necessarily bad; for example, business needs may evolve and force a corresponding project
adaptation. Balancing shifting priorities through scope changes is the difficult part of this
equation.

2. Complexity kills IT projects since defects and security vulnerabilities

increase non-linearly with increased complexity. Minimizing and
controlling complexity are key to successfully achieving a large-scale system
development success both in the development of individual releases and in the cost
and schedule of downstream upgrades to operational software.

3. Schedules and project chaos create event horizons, from which a

project cannot recover. Avoid the Project Event Horizon; Compute Schedule
Compression and Monte-Carlo simulate the Task Activity Network.

According to Wikipedia, in general relativity an event horizon is a boundary inside which events
cannot affect an outside observer. Combine a complex technical environment with byzantine
project scheduling and workflow, and meltdown becomes likely. Simplify wherever and
whenever possible.

4. The initial requirements for any large system will be incomplete,

independent of the resources expended to develop them. Ensure planned
requirements can be delivered within cost and schedule estimates, but also include
budget for anticipated and actual requirements change; rigorously test, accept, and
track requirements as they are met.

5. Unvalidated requirements pave the road to project failure. Test and

validate requirements as early as possible before basing significant projects upon
them; use pilots where possible before fully committing.

Requirements planning is an absolute foundation for successful project delivery, which is

always rooted in well-defined user requirements and carefully managed estimates. If you screw
up here, failure is inevitable.

6. You can’t manage what you can’t see. Track Project Status and Progress
against small, testable, incremental product deliverables and use quantitative
project parameters, such as Earned Value, to make projects visible and
manageable.

7. Not controlling the right things assures failure. Use well established best

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 11 ‘Laws of IT Physics’ | IT Leadership | TechRepublic.com

practices such as Risk Management, Requirements Management; Defect

Management; and Integrated Baseline Reviews to control projects.

8. Poor defect management causes high rework and leads to project

failure. Use automated testing and continuous integration to prevent defects, and
continuously identify out of phase defects to correct their root causes.

Yes, testing matters a lot. Just ask retailer J.Crew, which lost the ability to ship product to
customers after deploying a new web site and content management system without sufficient
testing.

Related: J.Crew: Failed upgrade hits financial performance

Testing isn’t rocket science, but it must be performed in a disciplined and consistent manner.

9. Unknown and untreated vulnerabilities originating in ineffectually

implemented processes destroy IT projects. Automate vulnerability
identification and prioritize fixes which root-out and fix processes lacking critical
essential detail needed to achieve bottom-line objectives.

10. Development contractors will do what is in their financial interest,

and government organizations may be led toward a project event
horizon. Incentivize well and wisely, trust but verify, and use Award-Fee type
contracts; carefully construct the Award-Fee criteria to address principal project
objectives over the near term; identify what Award-Fee structure will sufficiently
motivate the development contractor.

Every major IT project consists of a partnership I call the Devil’s Triangle: customer, technology
provider, and system integrator working together to achieve a common goal. These groups have
interlocking and sometimes conflicting agendas, which makes management a balancing act of
priorities.

Related: Consulting’s dirty little secret

Most consulting companies are honest folks doing the right thing for their customers. Still, you
need to protect yourself from bad apples by carefully controlling contracts, incentives, and
penalties.

11. Thoughtful, knowledgeable, committed people operating as a team

are critical to IT project success. Treat people as the valuable resources that
they are; take actions to create and maintain “jelled” teams.

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 11 ‘Laws of IT Physics’ | IT Leadership | TechRepublic.com

Although these 11 laws are oriented toward government projects, the lessons are equally
applicable to projects in the private sector. The list is worthy of your thoughtful consideration.

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Comments on this blog
Inadequate REAL, business requirements underlie all 11robin@... | 11/25/08

Standard excuse: don't have the timemgray@... | 11/25/08

Don't/won't have the timeTony Hopkinson | 11/25/08

The REAL business requirement ?Tony Hopkinson | 11/25/08

RE: 11 'Laws of IT Physics'wdperry@... | 11/25/08

Why have you put this on here?Tony Hopkinson | 11/25/08

Yes - Tony is right NEWpatmurray12@... | 11/26/08

Write everything down on NEWTony Hopkinson | 11/26/08

Some more interesting points to ponder, IMOdave.greenwood@... | 11/26/08

You're hitting close to the twelfth law NEWseanferd | 11/26/08

Sounds kinda like Systemanticskgbean | 11/26/08

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