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The main issue is a culture of sloppiness. They had safeguards, they had procedures, they just didn't care. A new software is just another thing they'll turn

The main issue is a culture of sloppiness. They had safeguards, they had procedures, they just didn't care. A new software is just another thing they'll turn off, not enter data into, or bypass for convenience. You need to code them a new culture.

rleigh 9y ago
Yes, software is a tool, nothing more, and unless it's part of a process which is enforced, it's worthless. The places I've worked at were very strict about it: no accurate data entry, no progress. And they also had physical cards to match to ensure entry of the written details before it got handed over. In this specific case, you'd likely want a card to physically accompany every bit of material so that you have a physical token to document and hand over responsibility, but that also has to be part of an enforced process. It's less easy to ignore or forget a token than glance over a screen and miss something of significance. If you store the cards on the wall when the material enters a room, it's also a quick visual indicator of the quantity of material in the room, and if you only have space for a certain number, it also acts as a simple physical restriction on the amount of material you can move into the room. Less sexy than computing technology, but for critical important processes, the movement and handover of physical tokens works very well. In the factory I worked at, the physical card was required to be physically handed over from department to department, and the information also put into the computer before the next processing stage could proceed. This was enforced; I once was part of a panic when some of the "tank cards" (which were the physical tokens representing the contents of storage tanks) went missing. They were found in a lab coat pocket after some frantic searching. But because the rules were enforced, this did block the physical process. And further delay and we'd have got an internal fine of £10000 which was another incentive for not losing track of them!

rleigh 9y ago

Yes, software is a tool, nothing more, and unless it's part of a process which is enforced, it's worthless. The places I've worked at were very strict about it: no accurate data entry, no progress. And they also had physical cards to match to ensure entry of the written details before it got handed over. In this specific case, you'd likely want a card to physically accompany every bit of material so that you have a physical token to document and hand over responsibility, but that also has to be part of an enforced process. It's less easy to ignore or forget a token than glance over a screen and miss something of significance. If you store the cards on the wall when the material enters a room, it's also a quick visual indicator of the quantity of material in the room, and if you only have space for a certain number, it also acts as a simple physical restriction on the amount of material you can move into the room. Less sexy than computing technology, but for critical important processes, the movement and handover of physical tokens works very well. In the factory I worked at, the physical card was required to be physically handed over from department to department, and the information also put into the computer before the next processing stage could proceed. This was enforced; I once was part of a panic when some of the "tank cards" (which were the physical tokens representing the contents of storage tanks) went missing. They were found in a lab coat pocket after some frantic searching. But because the rules were enforced, this did block the physical process. And further delay and we'd have got an internal fine of £10000 which was another incentive for not losing track of them!