by Michael Krigsman
October 8th, 2008 @ 4:08 pm

To really understand IT failures, it’s helpful to organize, categorize, and line them up like ducks. I group IT failures into management process trials and technical tribulations.

The management process trials category covers technology implementation projects that go awry. For example, when you read about the latest government project fiasco, with millions down the drain, you’re talking management process meltdown. J.Crew’s recent website fiasco is a great example of an implementation project gone wrong. Here’s how the company described its problem:

During the second quarter of fiscal 2008 we implemented certain Direct channel systems upgrades which impacted our ability to capture, process, ship and service customer orders. As a result, our Direct sales growth rate was lower than recent quarterly trends. We expect the impact of the systems upgrades to continue into the second half of fiscal 2008.

Rather than a single, bounded point of failure, the mess resulted from breakdowns during a larger implementation process. In this case, management seems to have pressured IT to release the site before completing full scalability testing. Most project-related failures fall into the management process meltdown category.