Identifying the critical success factors for major government projects that incorporate IT or “digital” developments

Abstract

Brunel University London is preparing funding proposals to support a multi-disciplinary study to identify new critical success factors for major projects within the UK government involving information (or “digital”) technologies, by interpreting them as political interventions rather than rationalisable IT developments or institutional changes. This study is timely as two independent reports on recent project failures illustrate how changes to the high-level governance and management of such projects introduced since 2010 have significantly increased the risk of failure, rather than reduce it as intended. This note sets out an analysis of these reports as a preliminary step that illustrates the urgency and importance of resetting the project control system around factors that improve the chances of success. It concludes by proposing objectives for such a study.