NSW TAFE's IT FAIL was so bad, 100 staff were hired to clean up

The schools version 'works' ...

... with much gnashing of teeth by the staff using it.

Then again I also worked on a 3 way departmental contract, ie the department was the 'customer', but the old Board of Secondary School Studies was the 'client' - never again. My PM had a heart attack during development, as did the Department's PM, I was 2IC - it was not fun & I learned never ever to do a project like that again.

".. and in nine years, was only able to bring it to pilot by 2015."

The problem (at least in part) was that they crashed on ahead and brought it to production after a very short pilot prior to that. Data conversion from the old system failed dismally and that should have been a red flag but instead they simply rescheduled the cutover to the following weekend.

Feedback from staff (that it was a an absolute crock) was totally ignored, both in the trial and after the cutover.

One can only imagine that some people at the top were determined to complete the project at whatever cost then move on to better jobs elsewhere without having to deal with the consequences. A very familiar scenario to anyone that's been in IT for any time.