The Unseen Face of E-Business Project Development

Abstract

The golden age of the dot.coms has gone. The euphoria of the opening has become the bitter taste of the failure. Enormous amounts of moneys has been invested in any new idea beginning with an E. Fabulous profits were expected, over night, just because the companies were on the Internet or because they used the newest technology. But the soap bubble growing while the money was pumped eventually blows up.

One of the more significant barriers to e-business development is the overlooked or underestimated cost of the project development together with the lack of a good project management. These are ones of critical issues that are almost ignored by the dot.coms. This position is more evident in the countries where the information technology has a low level of development. Most organizations are not focused on the project management and costs with all phases involved by an e-business project. Another mistake consists in manager orientation to the benefits only and not be conscious of the potential costs and risks.

The purpose of this paper is intent on identify and analyze the unseen factors of successful or failure of e-business project development. The IT managers must take into account both all costs involved in e-business development and all phases (analysis, design, testing, implementation, maintenance and operation) according to principle of project management for software/systems life cycle development. There are many solutions to exceed these factors of failure among could be counted outsourcing, a good project management, involvement of senior management, a real cost estimation etc.

Keywords: e-business, project management, factors of success or failure of e-business development, outsourcing

JEL Classification: M0, O33, L86, L81