Thanks for your comment. I had the chance to read your take on the subject (as well as the comments). The thing is every single entity in our profession is “for profit”, even PMI. Having said that, it doesn’t mean that something can be profitable and honest at the same time. I don’t understand why Standish would go through the trouble of creating a false/inaccurate report, I don’t understand as well what would be their benefit? Would they sell more copies at a $1000 each?

As for their numbers, 32% success rate is actually very reasonable in the software industry, and I think the definition of success is delivering a product that is useful to the business within budget and schedule (it can go reasonably above budget and above schedule). Challenged projects are those that go way beyond budget or schedule. Failed are projects that never get finished: killed, indefinitely postponed, etc… In my company, I can tell you that out of 3 projects we work on, one of them makes it (so that’s like 33%, sometimes less). This is the current nature of the software industry, lots of ideas, lots of projects going on, and eventually you will kill the projects that will not bear fruits and you will pamper the ones that will increase the company’s ROI. As you see, the heart of the problem is in deciding which projects to go for.

Thanks for the excellent analysis, it certainly resonates well with me. I believe your analysis holds true irrespective of whether one agrees with the Standish report.

I also like your suggested approach towards a solution. I try as many variants of it as my circle of influence permits me. More often than not, it brings good results.

Thanks again for sharing.

– Atul