A good looking UI is pretty important.  Even I don't care to stare at
an ugly application all day.  Many people called the Windows XP
interface 'Fisher Pricey,' but I like it more than the old plain Win9x
interface.

Yet these enterprises at the end of the day are made up of people, and
people don't like looking at ugly interfaces all day.  There's plenty
of studies showing people like pretty better, even if its not the best.
Just a few weeks ago on 20/20, they showed that pretty, less qualified
people were hired more often than highly qualified 'ugly' people.  Just
human nature I supposed (if you believe they did an accurate study).

At any rate, its pretty easy to bring some cohesion to the interface
design; get someone on the AppStylist program.  You can use that to
apply a consistent look to your application.  The feel of your
application is still up to you.

I've replaced my standard DataGridViews with the Infragistics GridView
throughout my application, even if the DataGridView was doing fine...
but I'm trying to mimic the look and feel out Outlook 2003.  In some
places, the 'prettier' interface also is more usable.  For example, I'm
using the ExplorerBar in place of the older, non-standard menus and
empty workspace area.

HTH
Andy

In this case I wouldn't blame using third party controls on this.  If there
is no coherence, then that can be accomplished no matter what controls are
being used.

It does sound surprising that there is no one paying attention to the UI.
Most companies like to have their own type of UI standards, so that their
applications stand out.

I know as a developer, it is hard for me to care about the look and feel, I
only care about what it can do. However, in my head, I know that a
consistent UI is important, and so is a look. However, I prefer that other
people worry about that.

You probably need someone, or a small group of someones whose job it is to
make things not only look pretty, but to come up with a set of UI standards
that developers have to conform to. For example, wrapping UI controls in
user controls is one way to do this - thus, developer end up unable to
change the underlying controls, since they are only able to interact with
the control through an interface, etc.

But yes, if there is no one in charge of this making sure standards are
followed, it is not going to be an easy task getting people to change their
ways. This isn't a small project either, coming up with these standards and
then implementing them is easily a full time job if you want to do it all
the way.