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Hertz paid Accenture $32M for a website that never went live (2019)

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Re: Hertz paid Accenture $32M for a website that never went live (2019)

#361
Interesting piece, but it would be nice if the author credited or cited the publication that most of it was copied from. Didn't even bother to remove its name where it makes no sense in its new context.

> A spokesperson for Accenture tells The Register...

Re: Hertz paid Accenture $32M for a website that never went live (2019)

#364
post #285

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Andersen Consulting/Accenture is my first job. Accenture directly sends me to the client after finishing my orientation program and 2-3 days of training. On my first day arrived at the client side for some initial discussion. I saw everyone standing with anxious faces and suddenly everyone spontaneously laughing. On lunch time, the client told me this was their first time engaging a big consultant firm and they did n…

kid/no kid is one thing, but were you able to deliver the insights they expected? I know I'd be pissed if I paid a high rate expecting an expert and then got a guy who doesn't know either.

A 22-yr old kid? I don't care how many future presidents you rubbed shoulders with at Yale, the answer is NO.

Re: Hertz paid Accenture $32M for a website that never went live (2019)

#365
I have been on the dark side of that world but let's keep the stories for another day. Here is a different mini-story on how big companies save money and fatten their margin.

In the early to mid-00s, a popular scripting language called ActionScript (sister of ECMAScript) powers Flash. A large Outsourcing company contacted me to ramp up a development team for a high triple-digit thousand dollars project. They had bought/inherited a code library, one of the most beautifully written codebases -- Object Oriented Java-Styled code with well-documented comments. I emailed the original programmer (part of the same forum group, I think), and he replied that if I need help, he is there.

The company was trying to set up a team to start with the code and build an entire application. When asked, why not just talk to the original author of the code, and he will do it easily instead of struggling for many months. It will take ages for the team to understand how things are written and why.

Well, the idea is all about cost and margins. They seriously don't care how good or even if the project completes. Their only motive was the number of hours and code volume (number of lines). They even factored in attrition from the team and the replacement cost in money and time.

So, the original programmer cost them $100 /hr (a good amount during that time), so the company spent a set budget to get just the needed framework. Then, they got a trainer (me) at about $20 /hr, which was costly (but had to) at that time (and geographic location). Finally, they cut and save by training those "engineers" who thought they could write ActionScript by clicking on the timeline on Flash.

There are excellent Services/Consulting companies and even brilliant teams inside these big companies. However, most people are just optimizing on volume and billable hours and have no care in the world about pride, dignity, or what the final product will be.

Re: Hertz paid Accenture $32M for a website that never went live (2019)

#366
post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

24 year olds? Since when are they sending the senior consultants out on engagements like this! I lasted not even 6 months working in professional services, really woke me up to what "prestigious careers" really are.

When I graduated back on 2010, Accenture has been around and was invited for an interview but I somehow got cold feet. In my country Accenture is one of the longest established companies here that hires fresh graduates who don’t know anything. I believe a part of that team are fresh graduates and bureaucratic project managers who have no clue how technology works but got promoted because of the college they came from…

I wonder what country this is..

Re: Hertz paid Accenture $32M for a website that never went live (2019)

#367
post #302

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As someone who holds a certification as an AEM Business Solutions Specialist (possibly lapsed by now) I have to agree. It's hot garbage.

How do I transfer out of AEM? I’m a junior dev at a company that uses AEM and I realized long ago that I’m wasting my time with it, but I have trouble landing interviews with AEM as my primary dev experience. I’m not an AEM author, I use Java every day.

Forget everything you know and keep learning Java or start learning C#. Yesterday.

Re: Hertz paid Accenture $32M for a website that never went live (2019)

#368
...and of course, at the end of the article, the author offers to sell some kind of project assessment. My assessment is that it is not money that will buy greatness. You need to have engagement. This is why this kind of project seems to be doomed from the beginning. Large enterprises are sadly not driven by highly motivated people. The project scope is humongous. You have all kinds of legacy to take into account. To compare with Uber, which has a platform written from scratch by a (probably) highly motivated team is just ... whishful thinking. It is just very hard to create a common goal and motivated people in such a large project. Throw in a global consulting firm and you have recipe for disaster. I've worked for 14 years as a developer consultant and I know that the top priority goal is to get the customer to pay the bills, if your project produces something great it is nice, but the thing that will get the bosses moving are unpaid invoices. Nowadays I'm with a product company

Re: Hertz paid Accenture $32M for a website that never went live (2019)

#370
If you know Accenture you also know that they love to hire fresh graduates and put them on projects as quickly as possible. Needless to say as a developer coming directly from university or a bootcamp you rarely have experience with writing good tests or documentation, developing maintainable enterprise software at all.

The only thing I'm wondering is how companies can be so naive thinking they get experts with multiple YoE from Accenture.

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