Here Is A List DoHA and NEHTA Ought To Think Carefully About.

The following appeared overnight.

GAO's 9 common critical success factors of federal IT projects

November 22, 2011 | Tom Sullivan, Editor

Knowing which tactics make for smooth, investment-worthy IT efforts can be as tricky as the projects themselves. Looking to shed some light on the matter, the Government Accountability Office (GAO) compiled a list of best practices based on interviews with CIOs and other acquisitions and procurement officials.

Using as a basis seven government IT projects – one of those being the VA’s Occupation Health Record-keeping System – the GAO boiled that list down to the “common factors that were critical to the success of three or more of the seven investments.”

Those are:

1. Program officials were actively engaged with stakeholders
2. Program staff had the necessary knowledge and skills
3. Senior department and agency executives supported the programs
4. End users and stakeholders were involved in the development of requirements
5. End users participated in testing of system functionality prior to formal end user acceptance testing
6. Government and contractor staff were stable and consistent
7. Program staff prioritized requirements
8. Program officials maintained regular communication with the prime contractor
9. Programs received sufficient funding

In the report, titled "Critical Factors underlying successful major acquisitions," the GAO also listed its top seven projects – so judged because they “best achieved their respective cost, schedule, scope and performance goals.”

More here:

http://www.govhealthit.com/news/gaos-9-common-critical-success-factors-federal-it-projects

With a ridiculous testing time table, low levels of stakeholder engagement, specifications dreamt up in a vacuum I leave it as to reader exercise to score NEHTA / DoHA out of 9!

Won’t be high I suspect.

David.