How to keep a big government project from exploding on the launchpad.

• Author: Eggers, William D.
• Position: Viewpoint essay

When it comes to launching a big, controversial government program, first impressions are everything. As we saw with the ill-fated rollout in the 1990s of California's electricity deregulation and of the Medicare Catastrophic Coverage Act a decade earlier, sometimes a big government initiative can never recover from a poor launch. It remains to be seen whether HealthCare.gov, as well as a few of the states' Affordable Care Act health-insurance exchanges, will recover from their own launchpad struggles.

In a book I co-authored with John O'Leary, If We Can Put a Man on the Moon: Getting Big Things Done in Government, we examined the launch of more than 75 major government initiatives since World War II. We found that the biggest danger during the launch phase was succumbing to what we called "the Overconfidence Trap," in which political leaders and public-sector managers underestimate the risks that accompany a new initiative.

Being overconfident, public leaders sometimes don't take the sort of prudent steps they should to maximize the changes of successful execution. But if you accept the possibility of failure, you can take steps to reduce its likelihood. Here are ways to avoid the Overconfidence Trap and minimize the risks of a catastrophic program launch:

Establish clear ownership. Who is the high-level political sponsor? Who is the day-to-day manager? Someone with strong execution abilities and the trust of the political leadership needs to own the project throughout the implementation phase. And take a cue from many successful initiatives by setting up a war room to manage the implementation. This helps to avoid the box-checking tendency of many project management organizations.

Be realistic not only about costs, but also about resources and time. Fight the political pressure to produce unrealistically rosy projections and timelines. Savvy politicians set expectations low. And assign a dedicated team to the project. It is unrealistic to ask people with major current responsibilities to execute a major initiative while still keeping up with their current jobs. The project won't get done right, and it might not get done at all.

Get the design right. This might seem obvious, but many implementation failures are actually the products of faulty design. In 1998, the California legislature unanimously voted to restructure the state's electricity system. Within two years, blackouts were rolling across the state and bamboozling California...