Another problem with governments is that they're made up of dozens or hundreds of different organisations, and they all make these mistakes on their own. Even if one organisation gets it right, other parts of the government don't benefit from that expertise.
I think governments should have a special organisation that just maintains the expertise for handling these sort of big projects all across the government.
That organisation would have as its only job to make sure all other government organisations get this right. It should be able to work when that's their only responsibility.
I think governments should have a special organisation that just maintains the expertise for handling these sort of big projects all across the government.