Now that the government is firmly entrenched in Wall Street's activities there is a high likelihood of the pot calling the kettle black. 

Think about it.

There are tremendous issues on the table right now where government is leading the charge and businesses and consumers will either benefit or face the fallout. Of course there's the financial industry along with healthcare reform and the debates about whether or not the bailouts will prove to be a smart decision. 

When you look more closely at these issues, you know that they all require Herculean IT efforts to make them successful. Whether the federal agencies focusing on enterprise architecture have teams of 10 or 10 million, with each dollar assigned to the tasks at hand comes the increased risk of failure. 

Here's why: the more people that are involved in an IT effort - from architectural strategy and design to software coding, development and deployment – the greater the risk of an error or policy violation slipping through the cracks and landing on the laps of our citizens.

For example, 3,000 Santa Clara, California residents were recently informed that they underpaid on their property taxes due to a computing error. Not to mention the Cash for Clunkers computer glitchesthat held up rebates and dealer claims

While no system is perfect, these seemingly minor glitches have a ripple effect that reaches deep into taxpayers' pockets. 

Moving forward, you can expect - and should demand -- even greater scrutiny on government IT processes, especially as they take on more public issues. While I don't claim to have all the answers, I will recommend that federal agencies take a closer look at their current IT infrastructure and their approaches to enforcing policies. 

I’m going to keep following the government's impact on our day-to-day lives in this blog and would appreciate any feedback and comments you have on the topic. 

Meanwhile, WebLayers is hosting a webinar on the very topic of governance and the enterprise architecture on October 21 with industry analyst and federal enterprise architecture experts fromZapThink. You can register for it on our Resources page