are any stories of getting it right / under budget / quiet sucesses?
Not trying to be funny but define "success". IIRC the Chinook Mk3 programme was regarded as a huge success around 2000 with one of the main culprits rewarded with grade skipping (CS terminology?) and a specially created job under his Director General. What I remember is this job entailed offering advice to project mangers and he started all his e-mails with something like "Based on my experience and success managing Chinook Mk3, I require you to....". I worked on ILS at the time so his missives didn't affect me as he didn't understand support and hadn't bothered with it on Chinook.
Think I've got the gist of this right but perhaps tecumseh would correct me if I'm wrong.