Ever Had Déjà Vu?
You know the experience. You're walking down the street, turn to your partner to say something, and you have the strangest sensation. It's like you're watching a rerun from a film you were a part of in the past. Scientists aren't quite sure what causes it. Is it the brain taking the exact experience you just had and rapid replaying it so you literally "have" the experience again, right then in your mind? A recent sci-fi interpretation would say the machines have rewritten something in The Matrix.
Whatever causes this phenomenon, it is a near to universal experience that brings puzzlement and at times amusement. In our average day to day life it is perfectly harmless. If it starts to creep into your business workflow though, the innocence ends. When déjà vu becomes a fundamental aspect of your business processes, it becomes business déjà vu, a particularly insidious form of Technology Misfit. And just like déjà vu in The Matrix, business déjà vu always means trouble.
How do you spell that again?
To illustrate what I mean by business déjà vu, let me share a couple of experiences I had recently in the market place. The first happened when my wife and I went to purchase a new vehicle. Once we decided on a make and model, the salesperson took down our personal information so he could present the offer. We did the usual back and forth a few times, but eventually settled on an agreed amount.
Then we were ushered into the business office. To process our loan, the business manager needed to enter our personal information into his credit program. As we sat patiently watching him re-enter the information we had already provided the salesperson, I found myself having déjà vu. "Hmm, here is someone in the car dealership's workflow duplicating information processing the salesman has already completed. And as the customer, I'm having to wait while he does it."
To make matters worse, he began to ask us for most of the information all over again. Why? Because he couldn't read the saleperson's "chicken scratch." He told us this was often the case.
Ten More Times
The next experience happened at the registry office. I was filling out forms relating to a business incorporation. The clerk handed me five pages required to complete my requested transaction. On every page I had to rewrite my name, company name, addressing information, and other details. As I moved from page to page I found myself having déjà vu over and over again, amazed that a company with the high volume of a corporate registry would have such an inefficient application process.
Of course at this point it was only the customer's time being wasted, but I didn't have to wait long for this inequity to be rectified. When I brought the forms back to the counter clerk, she proceeded to move from form to form herself on the screen, rekeying every piece of duplicate information I had written on every form.
Yes, you heard right. The same data was re-entered by both the customer and the clerk, about 5 times each. Business déjà vu outstrips traditional déjà vu 10 to 1! Then when she had me review each page for accuracy, I had to make corrections on three of the five forms. She had mistyped what I had written.
Counting The Cost
Business déjà vu costs your company. It costs you in lost minutes that translate to lost hours over time (or is that overtime?). It costs you customer dissatisfaction, because customers sense their time is being wasted. And it costs you inaccuracies in your business data, either because original hand written information cannot be read, or because data is re-entered inaccurately. Every time a piece of information is keyed in is one more opportunity for the information to be keyed in wrong.
Once Is Enough
How do you achieve Technology Fit and avoid business déjà vu? Make a commitment in this digital age, that no piece of information in your organizational workflow will ever be entered more than once. Make sure when it is entered, it is entered by the person who knows the information best.
You may need to use the same data in many places, but it should always be used from a single storage source, or at least copied from an existing digital source. Replace physical hand written forms your customers fill out, with web forms at a kiosk, or on the Internet if at all possible. This will insure the accuracy of your digital data. There is simply no excuse for business déjà vu with the technologies at your disposal today.
So if you see something happening again and again in your business processes, watch out! The Agents are just around the corner, and you're bound to have casualties.
Kel Good
MCT, MCITP, MCPD, MCSD for Microsoft.NET
Kel Good is a Microsoft Certified Trainer and Developer who specializes in consulting with business decision makers and managers regarding the
Technology Fit of their organizations.
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