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We're all familiar with over-exaggerated claims of being able to build them something in a weekend, but £113m for a recruitment web site?!

javajosh 8y ago
The administrative overhead of doing a government project is very, very high. I imagine that the time and effort spent on activity/progress reports totally eclipsed the amount of time spent on the product. And the report-writers, the people best placed to do something about the waste, aren't particularly motivated to fix it.
- iamben 8y ago
  Sure, but not to the tune of 113 million.
nmca 8y ago
So I'm assuming it was meant to basically be Salesforce and handle the whole CRM (RRM?) side too
timthorn 8y ago
It's worth reading the full report: https://www.nao.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2018/12/Investigation-into-the-British-Army-Recruiting-Partnering-Project.pdf https://www.nao.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2018/12/Investigat...
- jaclaz 8y ago
  Thank you. It is fascinating.
- arethuza 8y ago
  The MoD paid all that money and doesn't even get ownership of the code!
marcyb5st 8y ago
I wonder if the article is omitting information about the requirements. I mean, if the website is actually a portal that on top of the UI has some automation. Eg, once an application is submitted, it runs some sort of background check to asses whether the candidate meets requirement. Think about listing previous disputes with the law, problems with authorities, mental health problems, ties with extremists/other governments, ... . I can imagine the nightmare it would be to integrate with these N systems that are probably ancient, poorly maintained, and the people knowing how to handle them are extremely scarce. That would justify the price, IMHO.
- pjc50 8y ago
  From the report linked elsewhere: "2 .18 Applicants have to progress through a number of recruitment stages to join the Army, including medical, psychometric and fitness testing. In the first six months of 2018 -19, half of regular soldier applicants took up to 321 days to complete the recruitment process, from submitting their application to starting basic training ( Figure 6 ). There is a wide range in recruitment times, with some applicants completing the process a lot more quickly. For example, 16% of applicants took fewer than 200 days but 27% took more than 400 days ( Figure 7 on page 26). Applicants have encountered delays throughout the process, with long waits for medical records to be obtained from their general practitioner and then checked. These recruitment times also include around 100 days between being allocated to initial training and actually starting, although this can vary widely depending on the applicant’s circumstances and the availability of training courses." Ironically the process is slowed down by the failure of some other government IT disaster, this time to do with medical records.
  - marcyb5st 8y ago
    Thanks for taking the time and finding/pasting this. In Italy we had a similar case when the implementation of italia.it costed between 43 and 60 Million Euros [0] :/ After living in 4 countries the fact that the Public Sector is terrible when it comes to IT is the common denominator. [0] http://hi-tech.leonardo.it/italia-it-chiude-dieci-anni-di-soldi-pubblici-sprecati-il-costo-enorme-di-un-sito-mai-nato/ http://hi-tech.leonardo.it/italia-it-chiude-dieci-anni-di-so...

javajosh 8y ago

The administrative overhead of doing a government project is very, very high. I imagine that the time and effort spent on activity/progress reports totally eclipsed the amount of time spent on the product. And the report-writers, the people best placed to do something about the waste, aren't particularly motivated to fix it.

iamben 8y ago
Sure, but not to the tune of 113 million.

nmca 8y ago

So I'm assuming it was meant to basically be Salesforce and handle the whole CRM (RRM?) side too

timthorn 8y ago

It's worth reading the full report: https://www.nao.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2018/12/Investigation-into-the-British-Army-Recruiting-Partnering-Project.pdf https://www.nao.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2018/12/Investigat...

jaclaz 8y ago
Thank you. It is fascinating.
arethuza 8y ago
The MoD paid all that money and doesn't even get ownership of the code!

marcyb5st 8y ago

I wonder if the article is omitting information about the requirements. I mean, if the website is actually a portal that on top of the UI has some automation. Eg, once an application is submitted, it runs some sort of background check to asses whether the candidate meets requirement. Think about listing previous disputes with the law, problems with authorities, mental health problems, ties with extremists/other governments, ... . I can imagine the nightmare it would be to integrate with these N systems that are probably ancient, poorly maintained, and the people knowing how to handle them are extremely scarce. That would justify the price, IMHO.

pjc50 8y ago
From the report linked elsewhere: "2 .18 Applicants have to progress through a number of recruitment stages to join the Army, including medical, psychometric and fitness testing. In the first six months of 2018 -19, half of regular soldier applicants took up to 321 days to complete the recruitment process, from submitting their application to starting basic training ( Figure 6 ). There is a wide range in recruitment times, with some applicants completing the process a lot more quickly. For example, 16% of applicants took fewer than 200 days but 27% took more than 400 days ( Figure 7 on page 26). Applicants have encountered delays throughout the process, with long waits for medical records to be obtained from their general practitioner and then checked. These recruitment times also include around 100 days between being allocated to initial training and actually starting, although this can vary widely depending on the applicant’s circumstances and the availability of training courses." Ironically the process is slowed down by the failure of some other government IT disaster, this time to do with medical records.
- marcyb5st 8y ago
  Thanks for taking the time and finding/pasting this. In Italy we had a similar case when the implementation of italia.it costed between 43 and 60 Million Euros [0] :/ After living in 4 countries the fact that the Public Sector is terrible when it comes to IT is the common denominator. [0] http://hi-tech.leonardo.it/italia-it-chiude-dieci-anni-di-soldi-pubblici-sprecati-il-costo-enorme-di-un-sito-mai-nato/ http://hi-tech.leonardo.it/italia-it-chiude-dieci-anni-di-so...