Critical Evaluation: Queensland Health Payroll Project Failure

This report critically analyzes the Queensland Health Payroll (QHP) project, a significant failure in the public sector. It begins by establishing the background of the project, implemented by Queensland Health under IBM and CorpTech, highlighting its budget overruns and delays. The report then discusses standard project success criteria, including the triple constraint (time, cost, and scope), project management effectiveness, meeting stakeholder expectations, and customer satisfaction. It identifies and justifies the chosen criteria for evaluating the QHP project's failure, focusing on the triple constraint, customer expectations, and project management. The analysis reveals that the QHP project failed to meet these criteria, particularly due to scope creep, budget overruns, and failure to meet the needs of 75,000 employees. The report concludes that the QHP project exemplifies project failure and provides recommendations for future project management, emphasizing the need for accurate scope estimation and effective project management frameworks.

Running head: QHP
Queensland Health Payroll Project Failure
Name of Student
Name of University
Author Note

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Table of Contents
Background of the Case.......................................................................................................2
Discussion of the Standard Criteria.....................................................................................2
Identification and Justification of Criteria of Project Success.............................................4
Critical analysis of QHP Project based on the chosen criteria............................................6
Analysis on Basis of Triple Constraint............................................................................6
Analysis on Basis of Customers’ Expectation.................................................................6
Analysis on Basis of Project Management......................................................................7
Conclusion...........................................................................................................................8
Suggestions/Recommendation.............................................................................................8
References..........................................................................................................................10

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Background of the Case
The project chosen for analysis is “Queensland Health Payroll” (QHP) project. The
chosen project is an example of a failed project. The project was undertaken by Queensland
Health which is a public sector healthcare provider of Queensland State of Australia. The first
stage of the two stages payroll solution was implemented by Queensland health in March 2010.
The project was implemented under the management of IBM and CorpTech (Thite and Sandhu
2014). The consequence of this venture can be designated as an instance of project catastrophe in
many aspects including delayed delivery and project going over budget by 300%.
Project accomplishment or failure can be interpreted in a number of ways and therefore
success and failure aspects related to each project vary. The report aims to discuss the critical
criteria linked with successful accomplishment and failure of the chosen project. The report aims
in understanding and justifying of the reasons that is accurate for judging the failure and success
of QHP project. On basis of the chosen criteria, a critical analysis of the QHP venture is
presented in this document.
Discussion of the Standard Criteria
Project success criteria or factor refer to the measurable terms related to project outcome
which is acceptable to the end users, stakeholders or the customers for whom the project is
designed.
All the projects are needed to be carried out under certain constraints, which include the
constraint of time, cost and scope. These constraints are commonly known as triple constraint or
iron triangle of project management (Atkinson 1999). One of the standard principles of project
accomplishment or failure is linked with the “iron triangle”. A project can be labelled as a

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success if it can be accomplishment within a set deadline, has no scope creep and can be
implemented in a set budget (Coronado and Antony 2002).
It is to be investigated whether a project is a success only if its meets the triple constraint
or whether, there are other aspects that determines the success of a project. Apart from the triple
constraint, there are certain other factors that defines the accomplishment of a project (Shirazi,
Kazemipoor and Tavakkoli-Moghaddam 2017). These factors include the technical performance
of the project that has been implemented, customers’ acceptance along with the organizational
and cultural impact (Duncan 2004). The project success criteria is further related to the
appropriate management of the project risk. There are high probabilities of project failure if
critical risks in any undertaken work are not appropriately addressed.
It is often seen that poor estimation of the project needs or the standard expectations of
the stakeholders, leads to failure of the project. Poor estimation in a project generally increases
the project risks and contributes to its failure (Todorović et al 2015). Therefore, it can be
indicated that the standard criteria of project accomplishment or failure might differ in every
project depending on the expectations of the project.
It is possible to ascertain the successful accomplishment of an undertaken project by an
effective process of project management (Mir and Pinnington 2013). Proper management of a
project can help the team in identification of the major project risks and further helps in
management of those risks. Therefore, project success can be linked with the practice of effective
project management.
Different stakeholders’ groups might have different perception of project success (Davis
2013). To some, fulfilment of the stakeholders’ expectations can be considered as a principle

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criteria of success while for others, a positive monetary benefit can be considered as a standard
for project success (Joslin and Müller 2015). Therefore, the general criteria of process success
can be summarized as follows-
1. Fulfillment of Triple Constraint/ Iron Triangle
2. Project Management
3. Meeting Stakeholders’ expectations
4. Meeting the expectations of the clients
5. Accurate Project estimation
6. Positive returns from the project.
The above points indicate the critical criteria of successful project execution. The
successful accomplishment of any project can be appraised in terms of the above acknowledged
six criteria.
Identification and Justification of Criteria of Project Success
The above section has identified six critical criteria of project success. As indicated
earlier, the failure or successful accomplishment of any project is principally based on
perception. For example, the “Sydney Opera House Project” although was completed with 16
times more budget than estimated and a much extended time than estimated to complete, is
considered as a success and it was able to meet the expectations of the clients while “Millennium
Dome project” in London is a failure as it could not fulfil the expectations of the stakeholders,
although the entire project was completed well within the range of original budget and schedule.

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On basis of the findings of the previous section, certain standard criteria are chosen based
on which the QHP project will be evaluated in the following section. These standard criteria are
indicated as follows-
1. Fulfilment of Triple Constraint: The triple constraint or iron triangle indicates that it
is necessary to execute a project within its boundary of time, scope and cost. Choice of Triple
constraint as a standard criteria of measuring project success is justified since a scope creep in
any project results in increased project delay and cost overrun (Tinoco, Sato and Hasan 2016).
An uncontrollable delay and cost overrun can result in project failure.
2. Fulfilment of Customers’ Expectations: majority of the projects are undertaken
based on the requirements and the customers’ expectations or the end users (Kerzner 2017).
Therefore, it is justified to evaluate the success of a project on aspect of fulfilment of the
expectations of the customers. The customers can be an important project stakeholder as well.
3. Project Management: Choosing an appropriate framework of managing a project is
another standard criteria of project accomplishment. It is possible to ascertain that successful
accomplishment of a project for opting to choose and appropriate method in successful project
execution and control.
The above three criteria are chosen to be the standard criteria for evaluating the
successful accomplishment of an undertaken project. While planning the execution of a project,
it is necessary for the team to keep into considerations the expectations of the customers, the
triple constraint factors and the framework opted for management and execution of an
undertaken project (Meredith, Mantel Jr and Shafer 2017). Based on the above three standard
criteria, the QHP project is analysed in the following section.

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Critical analysis of QHP Project based on the chosen criteria
In the previous section, the standard criteria of evaluation of the accomplishment or
failure of the project has been identified. On basis of those criteria, the case of “Queensland
Health Payroll project” will be evaluated to comment on the success or catastrophe of the
project.
Analysis on Basis of Triple Constraint
The investigation of the case of QHP project indicate that out of the estimated time of
seven months, only 2 months were given for identification of the scope. The main contractor for
the project was IBM and IBM had no prior experience of handling or implementing a project of
such a large size. The payroll system that was proposed to be established was expected to handle
and manage 24,000 diverse payment grouping (Eden and Sedera 2014). The system to be
established was aimed in managing the payment of 85,000 staffs. The complexity of this project
was largely underestimated. It was not possible for the team to identify the scope of the entire
project in two months resulting in scope creep.
Since the scope of the project was not clearly identified, several change requests were
drafted throughout the execution process of the project leading uncontrollable project delay and
increase in project budget. Repeated change in scope and change in plan resulted in project going
over budget by 300% and project taking five years to complete instead of the original estimated
time of seven months (Paterno and Zhao 2018). Therefore, on basis of the standard criteria of
triple constraint it can be designated that QHP project failed to meet criteria of success and hence
it is an example of project failure.
Analysis on Basis of Customers’ Expectation

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Another important standard criteria chosen for analysis of the achievement and failure of
any project is customers’ expectations. A project can only be considered as a successful if the
standard expectations of the end users’ are met (Cserháti and Szabó 2014).
The first phase implementation of the QHP project was a disaster leading to incorrect
payment processing of majority of the staffs under Queensland Health Payroll. The system which
was supposed to manage the payment of 85,000 was a failure as it affected more than 75,000
employees and could not meet the expectations of the end users (Paterno and Zhao 2018).
Therefore, on basis of the standard criteria of fulfilling customers’ expectations, it can be
indicated that QHP project is a classic case of failure.
Analysis on Basis of Project Management
Evaluation of the standard criteria indicate that to ensure success of a project, it is
necessary to select a proper project management approach. The successful accomplishment of
any project is dependent on the competence of the project manager to efficaciously execute and
accomplish a project (Alias et al. 2014).
The QHP project has shown evidences of failed project management. There were reports
of stakeholders’ unrest. A large group of stakeholders were associated with this QHP project and
each stakeholder has different set of expectations from this project (Paterno and Zhao 2018).
Furthermore, the project needed structured communication between the team and the
stakeholders that lead to team conflicts and increase in project management issues. Thus, it can
be said that no standard framework for managing the QHP project was followed that resulted in
this catastrophe.

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The evaluation of the QHP project on basis of the selected standard criteria indicates that
the project is an example of failure.
Conclusion
The report aims in defining the standard criteria of project accomplishment. The
successful accomplishment or failure of a project is largely reliant on certain standard criteria.
The report evaluates the standard criteria that can be taken into consideration for evaluation of
the failure or success. The “Queensland Health Payroll” project is appraised on basis of those
criteria shortlisted. The criteria are fulfillment of triple constraint, meeting customers’
expectations and following a proper project management approach. On basis of the standard
criteria chosen, it is observed that the QHP project is an example of project failure as none of the
triple constraints were met during the accomplishment of the project. The system was
unsuccessful to correctly process the payments of 75,000 staffs which indicate that the
expectations of the end users are not met. The secondary research establishes the presence of
project management issues in the project. Therefore, it can be indicated that the QHP project is
an instance of a failed project as appraised on basis of the standard criteria of success.
Suggestions/Recommendation
The analysis of the failure and the causes of catastrophe of the QHP project indicates the
presence of various loopholes in the project management approach opted for execution of the
project. If the project is to be re-run, certain preliminary steps are to be taken to ensure that the
mistakes that are done in past are not repeated. The recommendations that can be considered if
the project needs to be repeated are documented as follows-

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1. Considering the complexity of the QHP project, the project scope is to be estimated
correctly and for that, realistic time is to be allocated. Proper scope identification will allow
development of a feasible project plan.
2. Communication among the members is compulsory to manage several internal issues.
Therefore, it is suggested that the manager of this project develop a communication plan to
ensure proper communication flow among the team members.
3. It is suggested for the team to develop a realistic plan and allocate realistic time for
execution of the project undertaken. Underestimation of the total time needed to implement the
QHP project was a significant reason for its failure.
The above three recommendations/ suggestions can contribute to successful project
execution if the QHP project was to be repeated or re-run.

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phenomenon, its time to accept other success criteria’. International Journal of Project
Management, vol. 17, no. 6, pp. 337-342.
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implementation of six sigma projects in organisations’, The TQM Magazine, vol. 14 no. 2,
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factors in organisational event projects. International journal of project management, 32(4),
pp.613-624.
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International Journal of Project Management, accepted 5th June currently in press, JPMA-
01512, pp. 1-13.
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<https://eprints.usq.edu.au/346/1/DependentVariableArticleV8.pdf>.

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Eden, R. and Sedera, D., 2014, The largest admitted IT project failure in the Southern
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