For whom the bell curve tolls

A year ago I co-authored an article with my associate, Bill Dunn, which discussed Bell Curve theory and Y2K. We suggested that the completion of Millennium Bug repair projects should follow a bell curve distribution pattern. Similar to a roomful of students taking an exam, there should be a trickle of early-finishing high achievers, followed by a growing wave which crests at the top of the bell, and finally tapering off until only the under-achieving stragglers remain.

If most businesses and government agencies could complete their Y2K projects before the end of 1999, surely our economy and society would not be devastated by the handful of straggling, under-achieving organizations. The key would be whether the bell curve crested before the Year 2000 or after.

In October 1998, with 15 months to go until the new century would arrive, we expressed concern at the absence of any major organizations which had reached Y2K compliance — despite many firms claiming that they had begun working in earnest as early as 1995 or 1996. If the trickle of early-finishing high achievers had yet to begin, we speculated that the bell curve would not crest in mid-1999 — as public relations spokespersons kept assuring us — but instead would crest after the immovable deadline of Dec. 31, 1999, with disastrous results.

In other words, a year ago we were sure that time was going to run out. Unfortunately, nothing during the last twelve months has convinced us to change our view.

In fact, the situation has gotten worse. The results of a new survey were released on Sept. 30, 1999. This survey, called the Y2K Experts Poll, was conducted by CIO magazine, the Information Systems Audit and Control Association (ISACA), and Dr. Ed Yardeni’s Y2K Center.

The poll results are alarming:

• Fully 81 percent of large, global companies are still not Y2K ready. The trickle of high achievers has finally begun, but the cresting wave is nowhere in sight.
• Forty-three percent have pushed their project completion dates from the third quarter of 1999 to the fourth quarter of 1999 (and, I wonder, when Dec. 31 comes and goes, will they move their completion dates to the fifth quarter of 1999, and then the sixth quarter of 1999?).

• Twelve percent of large, global corporations admitted that they now expect to finish their Year 2000 repair projects in the Year 2000 or beyond.

• Twenty-three percent are still waiting for Y2K compliant mission-critical software from third-party suppliers. (What do they think, that software is like a toaster: you take it out of the box, plug it in, and it works perfectly?)

• Despite all this, 91 percent of poll respondents expressed optimism about the Y2K issue. (Reminds me of the optimism expressed by George McGovern and Michael Dukakis just before their respective election days.)

According to Dr. Yardeni, the chief economist at Deutsche Bank Securities and a noted Y2K expert, "I am puzzled that information technology professionals are so optimistic about the impact of Y2K on their organizations. Many of them are not ready yet. They are clearly expecting a victorious outcome, which may be raising complacency levels so high that people will not prepare for any possible malfunctions and failures."

Abbie Lundberg, the editor-in-chief of CIO magazine, said that she is "alarmed at the number of companies that do not expect to complete their Y2K work before the end of the year. Of those that do expect to finish in time, entirely too many expect to do so at the eleventh hour. Given the business world’s abysmal track record for technology project delivery, this does not bode well."

With less than 90 days remaining until Jan. 1, those people who understand that four out of five organizations are not yet done with their Y2K projects, but still insist that that most projects will be finished in time, are asking us to believe the bell curve distribution will look something like the Washington Monument. No trickle, no slow acceleration to a crest, no gradual tapering off. In other words, no bell-shaped curve.

Instead, we are told to expect a sudden spike. But for this spike to happen, the vast majority of organizations — regardless of size, type, or when they started working on the problem — must suddenly finish their Y2K repair projects within weeks of each other.

I submit that this notion is untenable, unrealistic, and statistically impossible.

Bell Curve theory tells us that the distribution of completion dates should look like, well, like a bell — certainly not a sudden spike. If, after many years of working on Y2K repairs, only 19 percent of large, global companies have completed the job with less than 90 days to go, I think it’s very safe to say the bell curve crest will not occur during 1999.

A year ago we wrote, "So what can we conclude? If no major outfit has yet been able to complete (the job), if the trickle of high-achievers has not yet begun, it is obvious that the bell curve will not crest in mid-1999. It will instead crest well after January 2000 — which means our economy and our prosperous way of life are in for some serious, possibly life-threatening, disruptions."

Twelve months ago, I expected that Y2K project deadlines would be routinely missed, especially given the time-consuming and tedious nature of software repair work. This has indeed come to pass.

However, 12 months ago, I did not expect corporate and government leaders to present such a concerted and relentless campaign of public relations optimism. This happy-faced spin campaign is, as Dr. Yardeni noted, "raising complacency levels so high that people will not prepare for any possible malfunctions and failures."

It’s not too late to take some action to prepare for possible Y2K-related disruptions. Optimistic PR statements will count for nothing if the essential products and services of our modern society are in chaos in a few short months.