RE: A Project Failure Due to Short Sighted Financial Considerations

DAB — Wed, 17 Sep 2014 18:48:31 GMT

Hi Kas,

Once again, I have seen a lot of this type of mistake in companies large and small.

Everyone assumes they can do it quicker, better, cheaper than the project could be done by using off the shelf products to speed up the build.

I once had Quality Control engineer decided he could build the best automatic check software rather than buy to top of the line off the shelf product.

I finally found out about it after he had spent over $25,000 USD on a tool I could have purchased for $5,000 USD. If I could I would have fired him, but my boss would not let me.

So I recommend that in the future, always do a cost benefit analysis to look at available products verses home built. Always double the cost/time/effort estimated by the we can build here crowd and you will find that you can often buy cheaper/faster/reliable than the build it crowd. Oh and always ask them how they are going to test and verify the home built unit, what the time for rework will be and are they willing to work free overtime to keep it online at the expected production rate. That usually ends the argument.

DAB