1. The Department recognised that the design of a best business process model should normally come before seeking an IT solution. The Department chose to develop IT first mainly because it did not have the authority to impose such a model on the independent Magistrates' Courts Committees. But the lack of a coherent model, allowing IT solutions to be integrated with business processes, increased the risk of project failure.
2. The success or failure of an IT development often depends on its scale and complexity. We have recommended that departments should carefully consider whether projects are too large and ambitious to be undertaken in one go.31 These lessons were particularly apposite in the case of the Libra project. Departments should think carefully about breaking up big IT projects into manageable pieces that can be delivered incrementally.
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31 1st Report from the Committee of Public Accounts, Improving the Delivery of Government IT projects (HC 65, Session 1999-2000, HC 65)