One Company's Way of Measuring Y2K Progress

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The following story is true, only the names have been changed to protect the guilty. I have a friend who is a Y2K project management consultant to a major insurance company (the name of the company is so well known that's it's a household name). This is the story my friend related to me. In March of 1998, this company started planning for Y2K remediation. They allocated a budget of over 350 million dollars and now have over 1400 people working on the project.

The methodology they used for planning was a 8 1/2" by 11" milstone chart that showed over 50 significant milestones. They soon realized that this would not provide them with the visiability they needed so they produced several hundred critical path method (CPM) charts using Microsoft Project (an automated planning and scheduling software product). Soon they realized they were behind schedule. They analyzed the schedule problem and decided to reduce the remaining durations in order to achieve schedule compliance. They also decided that the best way to measure progress was to measure hours worked, not work accomplished, but hours worked. In December they had an "All Hands" meeting and passed out pen and pencil sets to the key players who helped them get back on schedule.

My friend told me that he and others went to the Program Manager in early January and suggested a better way to measure progress. He suggested that they have a master schedule with summary activities supported by detail activities and the idea was to strike a baseline schedule and then compare forecast activities to the baseline and measure the difference through variance reports. The Program Manager gave them the nod and asked to see their results.

My friend tells me that when the Program Manager saw their reults he was livid. The variance reports showed them to be 4 months behind schedule. He ordered them to eliminate this new way of measuring progress immediately and go back to the old way of doing business.

I wonder how many other companies Y2K Program Managers share his mind-set.

-- Tooter (anon@anonymous.com), February 06, 1999

Answers

Hi Tooter. Sorry to say, more than you would care to know I'm afraid. Management thinks in that mind set. Progress, not problems.

-- Sysman (y2kboard@yahoo.com), February 06, 1999.

Is there even one company that will be compliant?

-- RobbY2k (robby2K@unomail.com), February 06, 1999.

The Program Manager probably wasn't ready at that point in time of his career to throw in the towel. Too bad your friend doesn't have an ear somewhere higher up the chain of command, but then again, he may be out of a job too.

-- ~~ (~~@~~.com), February 06, 1999.

Tooter; Sounds like by your post that your company is doing a deja vou (sp) sorry. It reminds me of the early days of when computer systems started. And the four digit systems began, but using the wrong numbers to save space on disks... Furie...

-- Furie (furieart@dnet.net), February 07, 1999.

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