An exploratory study of ICT projects failure in emerging markets

ABSTRACT

Information and communication technology (ICT) projects still suffer from high failure rates, especially in emerging markets. This paper investigates existing trends and influencing factors for this failure in such a context, using a representative sample of organizations in Saudi Arabia (SA). To this end, two sources of data collection are used, a corporate survey on local and multinational organizations working in SA including a qualitative analysis of the participants’ answers, and archival data of a real-world case study of a challenging software project. The management/organization factors including lack of planning, resistance to change, misunderstanding user requirements, government regulations, poor business process reengineering, and lack of training were found to be the key indicators that influence ICT project failures. However, technical factors (e.g. redesign required for government compliance such as the use of the Hijri calendar) and financial reasons tend to have reduced influence because of extensive government subsidization in such countries. To generalize our findings, we compare and discuss our results with another Middle Eastern market. The comparison found that the lack of planning is the most important factor of failure between the two countries. The results may also apply to other emerging markets.

KEYWORDS:

• Emerging markets
• failure
• information and communication technology (ICT)
• IT management
• software project management

Notes

1. www.standishgroup.com.

2. A number of practitioners and researchers have generally presented some limitations on the Standish Group’s Chaos reports, as described in (Eveleens & Verhoef, 2010; Glass, 2005; Jorgensen & Molokken-Ostvold, 2006).

3. https://cs.calvin.edu/courses/cs/262/kvlinden/resources/CHAOSManifesto2012.pdf.

4. https://www.msci.com/market-cap-weighted-indexes.

5. The previous URL.

6. BMI (Business Monitor International) website is http://www.bmiresearch.com/.

7. Structures that become manifest in the interdependencies between entities and resources can be described as ecosystems. Some of the entities may be persons, such as stakeholders, whereas the resources can originate in the business requirements or the culture of the organization (Alami, 2016).

8. A PMO is a group/department within an enterprise that defines and maintains standards for PMs within the organization (Altahtooh & Emsley, 2013).

9. Yesser program is an umbrella for all Saudi e-government activities, procedures, legislations and other related issues and acts as the government’s controller. The program has been launched and regulated in cooperation with three entities, the Ministry of Communication and IT, the Ministry of Finance and Communication, and the IT Commission. The official site is (http://www.yesser.gov.sa/en).

10. World Atlas. The world’s most war-torn countries. Retreived November 1, 2017, from http://www.worldatlas.com/articles/the-world-s-most-war-torn-countries.html