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In November 1998, Statistics Canada discovered that the majority of the organizations in Canada are not well prepared for the millennium bug. The bug is lethal. Unless appropriate changes are made, when computer systems read the date January 1, 2000, they will assume that the year 1900 has been reached. The potential consequences are horrendous and could lead to the failure of organizations, accounting systems, communications systems and numerous automated devices. Yet Statistics Canada found that only one organization in ten even had a formal work plan to deal with the issue. CICA President Michael Rayner serves on Industry Canada's Task Force Year 2000. He volunteered CICA to develop material to meet a pressing need: clarifying what directors can do to help ensure their organization addresses this issue promptly. The CoCo team worked with CICA's information technology specialists. Our CoCo Board and Directors Advisory Group helped by reviewing the resulting guidance. The document reflects the sobering conclusions of thousands of experts. There will be no "silver bullet" to provide a quick-fix universal solution. Rather, each organization will need to perform a painstaking analysis and a step-by-step plan to address the high-priority problems. Contingency plans will be needed for the unforeseeable problems that are almost certain to occur.
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