[GTALUG] better than average article on why the federal payroll system is a mess

[Alvin Starr]

On 08/12/2016 12:34 PM, Christopher Browne via talk wrote:
> On 12 August 2016 at 11:49, o1bigtenor via talk <talk at gtalug.org> wrote:
>> On Fri, Aug 12, 2016 at 10:41 AM, Alvin Starr via talk <talk at gtalug.org> wrote:
>>> On 08/12/2016 11:13 AM, D. Hugh Redelmeier via talk wrote:
>>>
>>> There have been a bunch of headlines about the new federal payroll
>>> system "Phoenix" is screwing up a lot.  This article does a reasonable
>>> job of describing how the problems happened.
>>>
>>> <http://www.itworldcanada.com/blog/phoenix-payroll-report-by-michael-wernick-the-clerk-of-the-privy-council/385370>
>>> Interesting.
>>>
>>> I have a slightly different take.
>>>
>>> Through my wife's work I have had a chance to see lots of government
>>> projects (mostly Ontario) and I have come to the conclusion that the
>>> insistance of project managers to go with safe products like Oracle and
>>> Microsoft and Cisco are the reason lots of projects are off the rails.
>>> Big companies know how to bill and charge for changes but the products and
>>> services seldom come close to the sales pitch.
>>>
>>> But nobody will get fired for buying IBM/Cisco/Oracle/Microsoft.....
>> My suggestion is that management get paid on effectiveness - - ie poor outcomes
>> first wage reductions (starting at 25% and growing quickly) and termination for
>> outcomes that just don't work (that's with an independent review to make sure
>> that something wasn't torpedoed because of an even goofier more senior exec!).
>>
>> How would that work you think?
> That leads to cancelling the project throughly and regularly, and continuing to
> run the old software until it falls prey of some equivalent to the 2038 problem,
> and they have nobody that comprehends anything deep about the old system
> because those people all retired in the 1990's.
So your talking about standard business practice for lots of businesses.
I am still supporting software I wrote 25 years ago and can't get it killed.

>
> Ordering a government bureaucracy to not behave the way a government
> bureaucracy behaves is as foolish as trying to feed cats a vegetarian diet.
> Cats are carnivores, and we know to call those that have the delusion that
> it is a good idea to make them into vegetarians delusional fools.
Large organizations have a whole raft of issues relating to their size 
the problems that governments have is that they are just about the 
largest of organizations.
On the other hand large organizations have the resources to take part in 
large projects where large financial commitments must be made.

>
> It seems to me that the government had few real options in the matter; the
> Payroll Problem is big enough that it properly requires the business help of
> an organization like IBM.  (Other plausible options would include CGI,
> Accenture, PWC, Deloitte Consulting, KPMG, but those don't have
> the selections of hardware and software that IBM would offer, so I'm
> completely unsurprised at IBM falling to the top of the list.)
There seems to be a common misconception that commercial products are 
better than in-house designed products.
Governments could easily justify having their own in-house design and 
development staff but when projects go bad as often happens it becomes 
public knowledge and some bright guy says "you should have used a 
commercial product ....".

The thing is that you seldom hear about the big screw-ups at large 
corporations in the way of failed projects.
The shareholder reports don't have a category for money lost on bad 
projects.

>
> They can't contract it all out to Ceridian/ADP, which is what a whole lot of
> business do, because there's a large enough set of people doing
> Actually Secret Stuff, between payroll of:
>   - Prison staff
>   - Diplomatic staff
>   - RCMP staff
>   - CSIS staff (honest-to-goodness spies among them)
>   - Betcha paid informants need to get, um, paid...

That's not completely true. Governments contract with companies to 
undertake lots of tasks that require security.
Who builds the spy-satellites?
I use to work for a NATO hardware contractor and had access to secret 
information.

>
> Actually, my straight response to "be more business like" is pretty much
> pointing at this set of secret squirrels...  Businesses don't have these
> bits, and are not allowed to, pretty much.  Government isn't a business,
> which is a good reason NOT to put a "businessman" in charge.
Governments are a business in many respects.
The thing is that the corporate officers(politicians) are not paid in 
same way that an incorporated business CEO/director is.
So the pressures driving decisions are completely different.

Some times that difference is a good thing.

-- 
Alvin Starr                   ||   voice: (905)513-7688
Netvel Inc.                   ||   Cell:  (416)806-0133
alvin at netvel.net              ||

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