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Reminiscent of the state of Indiana's lawsuit against IBM for allegedly botching a project to automate the state's welfare system — lots of finger-pointing on b

Reminiscent of the state of Indiana's lawsuit against IBM for allegedly botching a project to automate the state's welfare system — lots of finger-pointing on both sides; the trial court's 65-page decision started out with the words, "Neither party deserves to win this case" [0]. The case has been up to the Indiana Supreme Court already [1]; on remand last summer, the trial court found that IBM is liable for USD $128 million [2]. [0] https://www.scribd.com/document/100544020/Indiana-IBM-Decision https://www.scribd.com/document/100544020/Indiana-IBM-Decisi... [1] http://www.in.gov/judiciary/opinions/pdf/03221601shd.pdf http://www.in.gov/judiciary/opinions/pdf/03221601shd.pdf [2] https://www.indystar.com/story/news/2017/08/07/court-ibm-owes-state-128-m-welfare-privatization-dispute/544789001/ https://www.indystar.com/story/news/2017/08/07/court-ibm-owe...

wahern 9y ago
Apropos HN, he then says, officials set out to fix Indiana's poorly-performing welfare system by inserting an untested, theoretical experiment, and substitute personal caseworkers with computers and phone calls ("remote eligibility"). This is now admitted to be an error, and there is nothing in this case, or the Court's power, that can be done to correct it, or remedy the lost taxpayer money or personal suffering of needy Hoosiers.
- toomanybeersies 9y ago
  ML based welfare eligibility screening seems a few short steps from Kafka. I'm not sure if that's what they were doing, but it seems like something that somebody would think is a great idea.
  - samstave 9y ago
    The ONLY person who would think all that is a good idea are the engineers who were able to update their linkedin with "implemented ML based solution to replace human resources with computer resources to streamline the welfare system for the state of X"
    - theossuary 9y ago
      I don't think any engineer would consider that a good idea. But if somebody tells you that's what you're working on for the next few years, make lemonade I guess.
      - wolco 9y ago
        Still sounds like fun to build.
    - paulie_a 9y ago
      LinkedIn is basically the epitome of HR pointlessness. so that would probably be a bullet point to not include
    - fphhotchips 9y ago
      That's not at all true. The only engineers who would think all that is a good idea are those who could update their LinkedIn. The salespeople and non-technical leadership though? They're going to love the idea of ML (read: magic) based solutions to replace human resources with computer resources to streamline their welfare systems.
  - gowld 9y ago
    The quoted paragraph isn't ML, it's telecommunications.
  - nraynaud 9y ago
    In France a few years ago I registered for unemployment benefits (that was quite a quest), I received a letter from the electricity utility telling me that I qualified for a reduced price. Later when I found a job, they put back the normal price.
  - Spooky23 9y ago
    States were successful in moving Medicaid enrollment to outsourced providers. THis was probably seen as building on that theme. I think IBM bought an Irish company that did similar work in the UK, so it probably looked achievable, and a potential Cash cow for other states. (Accenture was able to sell child welfare solutions at great profit in the 90s) Its a great business as it generates alotmof complimentary sales and services.
    - jessaustin 9y ago
      Accenture was able to sell child welfare solutions at great profit in the 90s In the 90s that would have been Andersen Consulting rather than Accenture. Although having worked with them at the time and found them worse in every way than IBM is described in this thread, I wouldn't be surprised to learn they profited at the expense of poor children.
- Spooky23 9y ago
  I've worked in the public sector and in support of a large complex social services system at a very large scale. It's a frustrating place to be put in charge of for a political appointee charged with reform, usually without alot of knowledge, or with a idealogical bent fueled by conservative dogma in this case. IGS is a shitshow, but outsourcing stuff like this is ridiculously dumb. IBM was in a position where failure was the only option, and anyone attempting to do this will fail. IBM underestimated the difficulty of the task, probably because the customer had zero clue.
hodgesrm 9y ago
Sometimes, you just gotta love the judges that handle these cases. The first 7 words you quoted plus the ensuing judgement are written very well.
tootie 9y ago
Or Oregon v Oracle over their state healthcare exchange. http://www.oregonlive.com/politics/index.ssf/2016/09/post_183.html http://www.oregonlive.com/politics/index.ssf/2016/09/post_18...
- Narkov 9y ago
  Or in Queensland with the $1.5b health payroll failure. https://www.itnews.com.au/news/queenslands-ibm-ban-lives-on-420969 https://www.itnews.com.au/news/queenslands-ibm-ban-lives-on-...
  - cletus 9y ago
    Ha, funny story about that. My brother-in-law's uncle is a doctor (specialist) in Queensland. A couple of years ago he told us a story about this. Because of the massive screwups a bunch of private practitioners like himself weren't getting paid by the state government for work they did for the public health system. It reached the point where a lot of doctors were simply not going to provide nonessential services if they continued to not get paid (this went on for a year or more). So some workers in the state health department intervened to help resolve the situation. I don't remember the specifics but they essentially approved an advancement that sort of looked like a loan as far as the government system was concerned. So this guy did get paid. Almost a year later he started getting threatening letters from the government for defaulting on his loan and I think they were threatening court action. The health department who organized this were sympathetic but said because of the system their hands were tied. This actually reached the point of the government initiating an investigation and potentially having ramifications for his medical license with the health department seemingly powerless to stop these wheels that were put in motion and looked to be headed to court. So this guy ended up sending a letter to the health minister threatening to not provide any medical services to the state government at all if this wasn't resolved. Now this would actually have left the state in a pickle as for some things he was the only provider in the state, basically. Sure enough it was resolved within 2 weeks and the health minister apologized. Anyway, from this one anecdote it certainly seemed like Queensland health was a disaster.
    - 9y ago
dpweb 9y ago
Sales and Engineering - very different competencies. Companies like IBM are NOT technology companies. They are sales-culture oriented, and their product HAPPENS TO BE technology. In fact you could argue, the only way to win big enterprise contracts in the first place, is to be a sales-culture company. But after selling the deal, their workers have to solve a difficult engineering and organizational management problem simultaneously (the project). They use contractors (devs) which proves they are not an engineering but sales culture. So, you need to bridge the two worlds. That's the PMs. These are the most incompetent members of the team. The devs very often are very smart. Draw horizontal lines on the org chart. The sales guys are at the top. They are generally competent. Proof = they sold a massive deal. The devs are at the bottom. They are often competent. They have to be or they wouldn't get hired or find work. You can PROVE someone doesn't know dev work. But, they don't have enough POWER to change things or fix things. Reasons for failure: 1. The middle. This is the breakdown. Many PMs often have no real skills. ORGANIZING for success, given a complex technical and organizational problem. 2. The projects are too big. Any huge project is from the get-go at an unacceptable level of risk. Decentralization, Deconstruction is powerful. The projects must be broken into smaller pieces to be managed.
- dctoedt 9y ago
  > Sales and Engineering - very different competencies. Companies like IBM are NOT technology companies. They are sales-culture oriented, and their product HAPPENS TO BE technology. In fact you could argue, the only way to win big enterprise contracts in the first place, is to be a sales-culture company. An EDS executive's alleged overpromising, in landing a big contract to build a CRM system for British Sky Broadcasting, ended up costing EDS big bucks: USD $460 million, or more than four times the value of the original contract [0]. [0] http://www.oncontracts.com/eds-british-sky-overpromising/ http://www.oncontracts.com/eds-british-sky-overpromising/ (self-cite)
  - rahimnathwani 9y ago
    "After the decision was handed down, Sky announced that it expected the damage award to be at least £200 million. Had it not been for the misrepresentation claims, the pure-contract damages presumably would have been capped at £30 million. The difference works out to about US$270 million." Seems like a math error.
ars 9y ago
And Pennsylvania suing IBM: http://fortune.com/2017/03/10/pennsylvania-ibm-lawsuit-tom-wolf/ http://fortune.com/2017/03/10/pennsylvania-ibm-lawsuit-tom-w...
mathattack 9y ago
I’ve had nothing but terrible experiences with IBM Global Services. With deals like this, the commission check is cut long before the problems arise.
- megaman22 9y ago
  With Oracle involved, you've also got the strong possibility that the salesperson who got the commission check on the deal is long gone by the time the product is delivered. Turnover is unreal on some of those teams. I have a friend who no longer works there that had 100% turnover on their team in six months.
matwood 9y ago
IBM consulting and many state governments are a mess. It’s no surprise a large project requiring both to function properly failed.

wahern 9y ago

Apropos HN, he then says, officials set out to fix Indiana's poorly-performing welfare system by inserting an untested, theoretical experiment, and substitute personal caseworkers with computers and phone calls ("remote eligibility"). This is now admitted to be an error, and there is nothing in this case, or the Court's power, that can be done to correct it, or remedy the lost taxpayer money or personal suffering of needy Hoosiers.

toomanybeersies 9y ago
ML based welfare eligibility screening seems a few short steps from Kafka. I'm not sure if that's what they were doing, but it seems like something that somebody would think is a great idea.
- samstave 9y ago
  The ONLY person who would think all that is a good idea are the engineers who were able to update their linkedin with "implemented ML based solution to replace human resources with computer resources to streamline the welfare system for the state of X"
  - theossuary 9y ago
    I don't think any engineer would consider that a good idea. But if somebody tells you that's what you're working on for the next few years, make lemonade I guess.
    - wolco 9y ago
      Still sounds like fun to build.
  - paulie_a 9y ago
    LinkedIn is basically the epitome of HR pointlessness. so that would probably be a bullet point to not include
  - fphhotchips 9y ago
    That's not at all true. The only engineers who would think all that is a good idea are those who could update their LinkedIn. The salespeople and non-technical leadership though? They're going to love the idea of ML (read: magic) based solutions to replace human resources with computer resources to streamline their welfare systems.
- gowld 9y ago
  The quoted paragraph isn't ML, it's telecommunications.
- nraynaud 9y ago
  In France a few years ago I registered for unemployment benefits (that was quite a quest), I received a letter from the electricity utility telling me that I qualified for a reduced price. Later when I found a job, they put back the normal price.
- Spooky23 9y ago
  States were successful in moving Medicaid enrollment to outsourced providers. THis was probably seen as building on that theme. I think IBM bought an Irish company that did similar work in the UK, so it probably looked achievable, and a potential Cash cow for other states. (Accenture was able to sell child welfare solutions at great profit in the 90s) Its a great business as it generates alotmof complimentary sales and services.
  - jessaustin 9y ago
    Accenture was able to sell child welfare solutions at great profit in the 90s In the 90s that would have been Andersen Consulting rather than Accenture. Although having worked with them at the time and found them worse in every way than IBM is described in this thread, I wouldn't be surprised to learn they profited at the expense of poor children.
Spooky23 9y ago
I've worked in the public sector and in support of a large complex social services system at a very large scale. It's a frustrating place to be put in charge of for a political appointee charged with reform, usually without alot of knowledge, or with a idealogical bent fueled by conservative dogma in this case. IGS is a shitshow, but outsourcing stuff like this is ridiculously dumb. IBM was in a position where failure was the only option, and anyone attempting to do this will fail. IBM underestimated the difficulty of the task, probably because the customer had zero clue.

hodgesrm 9y ago

Sometimes, you just gotta love the judges that handle these cases. The first 7 words you quoted plus the ensuing judgement are written very well.

tootie 9y ago

Or Oregon v Oracle over their state healthcare exchange. http://www.oregonlive.com/politics/index.ssf/2016/09/post_183.html http://www.oregonlive.com/politics/index.ssf/2016/09/post_18...

Narkov 9y ago
Or in Queensland with the $1.5b health payroll failure. https://www.itnews.com.au/news/queenslands-ibm-ban-lives-on-420969 https://www.itnews.com.au/news/queenslands-ibm-ban-lives-on-...
- cletus 9y ago
  Ha, funny story about that. My brother-in-law's uncle is a doctor (specialist) in Queensland. A couple of years ago he told us a story about this. Because of the massive screwups a bunch of private practitioners like himself weren't getting paid by the state government for work they did for the public health system. It reached the point where a lot of doctors were simply not going to provide nonessential services if they continued to not get paid (this went on for a year or more). So some workers in the state health department intervened to help resolve the situation. I don't remember the specifics but they essentially approved an advancement that sort of looked like a loan as far as the government system was concerned. So this guy did get paid. Almost a year later he started getting threatening letters from the government for defaulting on his loan and I think they were threatening court action. The health department who organized this were sympathetic but said because of the system their hands were tied. This actually reached the point of the government initiating an investigation and potentially having ramifications for his medical license with the health department seemingly powerless to stop these wheels that were put in motion and looked to be headed to court. So this guy ended up sending a letter to the health minister threatening to not provide any medical services to the state government at all if this wasn't resolved. Now this would actually have left the state in a pickle as for some things he was the only provider in the state, basically. Sure enough it was resolved within 2 weeks and the health minister apologized. Anyway, from this one anecdote it certainly seemed like Queensland health was a disaster.
  - 9y ago

dpweb 9y ago

Sales and Engineering - very different competencies. Companies like IBM are NOT technology companies. They are sales-culture oriented, and their product HAPPENS TO BE technology. In fact you could argue, the only way to win big enterprise contracts in the first place, is to be a sales-culture company. But after selling the deal, their workers have to solve a difficult engineering and organizational management problem simultaneously (the project). They use contractors (devs) which proves they are not an engineering but sales culture. So, you need to bridge the two worlds. That's the PMs. These are the most incompetent members of the team. The devs very often are very smart. Draw horizontal lines on the org chart. The sales guys are at the top. They are generally competent. Proof = they sold a massive deal. The devs are at the bottom. They are often competent. They have to be or they wouldn't get hired or find work. You can PROVE someone doesn't know dev work. But, they don't have enough POWER to change things or fix things. Reasons for failure: 1. The middle. This is the breakdown. Many PMs often have no real skills. ORGANIZING for success, given a complex technical and organizational problem. 2. The projects are too big. Any huge project is from the get-go at an unacceptable level of risk. Decentralization, Deconstruction is powerful. The projects must be broken into smaller pieces to be managed.

dctoedt 9y ago
> Sales and Engineering - very different competencies. Companies like IBM are NOT technology companies. They are sales-culture oriented, and their product HAPPENS TO BE technology. In fact you could argue, the only way to win big enterprise contracts in the first place, is to be a sales-culture company. An EDS executive's alleged overpromising, in landing a big contract to build a CRM system for British Sky Broadcasting, ended up costing EDS big bucks: USD $460 million, or more than four times the value of the original contract [0]. [0] http://www.oncontracts.com/eds-british-sky-overpromising/ http://www.oncontracts.com/eds-british-sky-overpromising/ (self-cite)
- rahimnathwani 9y ago
  "After the decision was handed down, Sky announced that it expected the damage award to be at least £200 million. Had it not been for the misrepresentation claims, the pure-contract damages presumably would have been capped at £30 million. The difference works out to about US$270 million." Seems like a math error.

ars 9y ago

And Pennsylvania suing IBM: http://fortune.com/2017/03/10/pennsylvania-ibm-lawsuit-tom-wolf/ http://fortune.com/2017/03/10/pennsylvania-ibm-lawsuit-tom-w...

mathattack 9y ago

I’ve had nothing but terrible experiences with IBM Global Services. With deals like this, the commission check is cut long before the problems arise.

megaman22 9y ago
With Oracle involved, you've also got the strong possibility that the salesperson who got the commission check on the deal is long gone by the time the product is delivered. Turnover is unreal on some of those teams. I have a friend who no longer works there that had 100% turnover on their team in six months.

matwood 9y ago

IBM consulting and many state governments are a mess. It’s no surprise a large project requiring both to function properly failed.