Check Lists, Procedures and Drudgery

I have spent a considerable amount of my career designing procedures for best methods of operation. Before computers were widely used it was important that clerical or manual methods of operation operated at optimal cost effectiveness. When computerisation was in its infancy we often conducted studies to compare the cost of the manual operations against computerisation. We delayed automation if it was more expensive to computerise an operation . This is not the case today but it might be educational to make such comparisons; even now.

I am surprised that we have not made further advances in removing paper from our computer procedures which still rely upon manual operations to a greater or lesser extent. The technology is certainly good enough, now, to completely automate many procedures. For instance, whilst it is possible to settle a credit card account by arranging a variable direct debit to clear the whole outstanding amount, it is not so easy for the customer when they want to settle a lesser amount. I am surprised that a decision based system has not been developed to allow the customer complete flexibility on an automated basis.

Manual operations still need to be used in spite of it being feasible to completely automate some business operations. And it looks as if this will be the case for the foreseeable future. The man machine interface, therefore, needs to made as efficient as possible by the use of effective procedures. But tight procedures quite often cannot cope with the out of the ordinary situation and militate against flexibility.

All organisations now have such tight procedures and checklists, which are used to control the man machine interface, that they deny flexibility to the human operators. This is apparent when you 'phone a call centre. As long as you are calling about a routine request the operator, at the other end of the 'phone, is able to cope adequately. If, however, you are making a call about a matter which falls outside of the rules or checklists, that govern the behaviour of the human being, the procedure often falls down. Often the call centre clerk then is unable to answer a request or enquiry as they do not know what to do. Even a supervisor might not be able to deal with events which fall outside of the system rules. It is, as if the human beings themselves have become "robots" who cannot cope outside of the check lists and pre-ordained processes. Systems designers and back office managers should take this into account when organising the work. The staff should not be treated as if they are automatons, and they should be allowed and encouraged to think for themselves so that they can become problems solvers. At little bit of creativity should be allowed to creep back into the system for the sake of both the customers and the workers.

Automated systems give us the opportunity to take the drudgery out of repetitive work and free us all up to do something more creative than just push buttons.