Letter: Handling business cases difficult in practice
A reader writes that the Office of Management and Budget's definition of an acceptable business case varies yearly.
Regarding "Agencies mixed on meeting OMB's goals": I do not think many would dispute the importance of the business case as a component of an agency's IT portfolio. It is, however, disingenuous of OMB to lament the dearth of acceptable business cases. The consistency and guidance necessary to achieve success on a business case has not been provided.
Put simply, nobody knows, year over year, what must be done to achieve an acceptable business case because OMB changes the definition of "acceptable" every year. The format and content requirements suffer from the same lack of constancy. Again, different every year. Scoring of business cases is also problematic and highly subjective because of the lack of consistency and the extent of interpretation exercised by individual reviewers.
Great plan, but like so many great plans, suffering in the execution.
Mick Harris
Acting Director, Planning & Architecture
GSA/FAS/OCIO
Arlington, Va.
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