In the course of a single day, Knight Capital Group, “lost $440 million of the firm’s capital in a trading disruption which messed up the market.” Its value plunged from $1.5 billion to a little over $1 billion. While the details are still a bit sketchy, the culprit appears to be a good old-fashioned a system failure.

The more things change …

It’s funny and kind of perverse. I spend most of my time these days speaking, thinking, and writing about platforms, emerging technologies, and other forward-thinking types of things. Yet, we still see many of these high-profile IT projects gone amok. Although I started writing Why New Systems Fail four years ago, it’s evident to me that we’ve not solved many of the fundamental problems plaguing IT projects.

Simon Says: System Failures Still Haunt Us

Before your organization goes all “2.0” and spends a fortune on sexy new technologies, do the proper due diligence. Clean your data. Test and then test some more. And, for God’s sake, don’t attempt to go live under extreme duress.

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