A story from my life, a story of accompanying a client as a software expert
In the last few months, I accompanied a software company that was supposed to carry out a production floor computerization project in a large factory in Israel. I took the role of the expert on behalf of the defendant and opposing the plaintiff (on the side of a small software company against a large client).
I was not involved in the project, and everything I read and learned about it was from the many documents produced by the information systems project – characterizations, emails, discussion summaries and much more.
While I write my opinion, send it to the lawyer, he sends it back to me for corrections, I add a reference, send it back to the lawyer – and it’s still not over, I think to myself: how could this situation have been prevented?
The costs of lawyers, experts, the large claim amounts – so much money! Isn’t it a shame?
Every story probably has its reasons, but this story started with a draconian contract – as any large and powerful client knows to create, where the client thinks they will pay a little, do very little to complete the work, and the supplier will do it alone.
It continued with a supplier who really wanted to make a sale to this client and agreed to do a project at a very, very low price. As the project dragged on and became more complicated, the project’s viability diminished until it disappeared altogether.
It ended in a project that was halted in the preliminary stage, and ended up in court with huge costs.
In software projects, you need two to tango, and it can’t work any other way.
A client who pays too little, does not cooperate, does not take responsibility and is not involved in the project will not receive a working system, even if it is the best supplier in the world!
