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Project from Hell (2008)

projectfailures.wordpress.com

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Re: Project from Hell (2008)

#131

Post by kpil »

nwatson wrote: post #89
sjm-lbm wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They also started, if I'm doing my arithmetic right, in 1996. Honestly, I could see C++ having been their best choice back then. Every language I would rather do a large project in is either newer than that or would have been pretty immature for a large project in the mid-90s.

I sat through too many 3 hour cfront compiles.

My first job involved a 6 hour compile caused by that someone desperately had tried to beat a braindead homemade interpreted language into submission using a c preprocessor stage. Function calls where largely macro expansions...

All errors was reported as : syntax error on line 1. Fun times.

Re: Project from Hell (2008)

#132

Post by Robin_Message »

baud147258 wrote: post #13
mpweiher wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That would be the notice period. Germany is similar, it tends to be 6 weeks to the end of the quarter, and it generally applies to both employee and employer. Though it often isn't quite as applicable to the employee...what are they going to do if you don't show up, fire you?

> what are they going to do if you don't show up, fire you? They would fire you for grave offense (I'm not sure what the right word in English would be). But even firing or giving one's notice is long here, around three months.

Gross misconduct or insubordination is the wording usually used in UK contracts (IANAL, YMMV, etc)

Re: Project from Hell (2008)

#133

Post by goatlover »

commandlinefan wrote: post #74
recursive wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What in the actual fuck? I can't fathom how this would even theoretically work. Like people ostensibly would just memorize every api and library they might ever have to use in advance?

> memorize every api and library Outside of work hours, of course. You're paid to program, not to learn.

You can't be serious! What if you need to look up something? Is google forbidden too? Do you only pay programmers who have everything memorized?

And isn't programming a matter of continuous learning? How is anyone supposed to do a job like that and not be learning? You really expect your employees to learn everything they need to do their job outside of work? WTF?

Re: Project from Hell (2008)

#134

Post by hestefisk »

fnordsensei wrote: post #51
ryandrake wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What did the demotivational poster say? Consultants don’t make money with solutions, they make money by prolonging the problem.

That's the fallacy with hourly billing. The alternative model is value-based pricing, where you price the solution/intervention upfront. Of course, this becomes more expensive upfront as well, because the consultant takes on the risk. Hourly billing seems cheaper to the client, since they have to take on the risk instead.

Very few large projects like this are based on hourly billing / time and materials. Proper procurement would do fixed price contracts (outcomes based) with a set number of contract variations in place. Where large consulting companies / system integrators secure their margins (and tangentially try and screw over their customer) is by making the fixed price offer really attractive and then to hard on scope as requirements change to pump through as many contract variations as possible at a premium price.

Re: Project from Hell (2008)

#136

Post by yitchelle »

lucio wrote: post #59
lifeisstillgood wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But they are being fined at E1000's a day. In the UK we now have projects forced to go through regular if not frequent traffic light reviews - a panel of actual experts reviews the project - i think it was one such thing that killed the NHS network project (12 billion over spend). one panel, one review. saved money. i suspect the french gov will have put something similar in place, but i do agree with the final parag…

killed AFTER 12 billion over spend, not very effective

While its effectiveness is questionable, not killing it would be an ever bigger failure.

Re: Project from Hell (2008)

#137

Post by toomanybeersies »

Mandatum wrote: post #127
toomanybeersies wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At least in New Zealand, if you abandon your job, the employer can bill you for any costs incurred, e.g. if they had to get a worker from a temp agency, you'd have to pay for the worker, or at least pay for the extra costs of a temp worker.

That's incorrect unless you're a company contracting to an organisation, in which case you signed a contract saying you're going to stay and do X for period of time, and if they have to stop and scramble because you left without the contracting being breached - you're liable. Which is fair and universal. Employees on the other hand have NEVER been docked pay in New Zealand and you are in NO way legally obligated to t…

You can if you've specifically written it into the contract and made sure the employee is aware of the clause: https://www.employment.govt.nz/hours-and-wages/pay/deduction... (Recovering money owed if employee leaves without working out notice)

I'm not sure if it's ever been in any of my contracts, but it is apparently an option.

Re: Project from Hell (2008)

#138

Post by brazzy »

Sharlin wrote: post #119
brazzy wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Bullshit. I've worked as a consultant in Germany for 13 years, and pretty much every large project has consultants in it, often half the developers are consultants. IBM, T-Systems, Capgemini and accenture each have around 5000 people doing software consulting, and there'S hundreds if not thousands of smaller consultancies.

But those consultants are still regular employees of the consulting company, right They’re not independent contractors. I guess a client company can say that they don’t want person X in their project anymore but that doesn’t mean X is going to lose their job.

There are many independant contractors as well.

Re: Project from Hell (2008)

#139

Post by mar77i »

recursive wrote: post #97
commandlinefan wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> memorize every api and library Outside of work hours, of course. You're paid to program, not to learn.

Wow. So it's acceptable to spend a month re-inventing a wheel, but not one hour learning that it already exists? I wouldn't have thought such a backwards employer exists.

...backwards employer? NIH.

Re: Project from Hell (2008)

#140

Post by draw_down »

TheMagicHorsey wrote: post #110

There are a lot of jobs like this in economies where stasis and stability are prized over creative destruction. These organization continue to exist because companies are considered sacrosanct ... they are sources of jobs that are to be protected at all costs. The jobs themselves are sacrosanct. Very hard and slow to fire people. So people hire slowly. So there are few jobs. So the few open positions are positions wh…

Whoops, you missed the part where people were fired for being one minute late
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