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That attitude is so amazingly pervasive throughout all IT. The notion of only buying something that is "tested" is due to most managers' risk aversion. They are not willing to bet their jobs on some company or technology until x% of their peers have already done it.

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You are totally right about the pervasive attitude throughout corporate IT organizations. The only point I would question is the "..willing to lose their jobs.." part. Most corporate IT orgs have their story so well prepared to deflect blame in the case of failures that employees are rarely, if ever terminated. Instead the business takes the failure on the chin and all of us in technology have to deal with the reduction in credibility.

There is a tendency the higher profile a failed project is, the highest the chance to redefine success based on its results.

This stems from the pain of firing the high-level executive that signed the check. The larger the check, the higher the executive is in the corporate ladder and the more painful the firing, thus, the executive is never fired because the project cannot fail.

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