WorldWide Drilling Resource

31 WorldWide Drilling Resource ® SEPTEMBER 2019 With Computers, Half a Loaf is Often not Better than None by Britt Storkson Owner, P2FlowLLC Just about everyone nowadays has had a run-in with those automated phone call routers. You know, the computer-generated female voice that keeps saying “I’m sorry I didn’t hear that” over and over again, even when you are yelling into the phone. The fact is, the computer heard what you were saying, it just didn’t understand what you were saying. The software did not compute. This is a classic example of a computer that works, but doesn’t work in total. To that I would say: If the computer does not perform satisfactorily under all conditions it is expected to manage, then why have it? To apply this concept to other areas: What if this computer was flying the airplane you are on? What if there was something it couldn’t handle? What would it do then? Most of the time, the software is programmed to hand control back to the operator (the pilot in this case), but what if the pilot is distracted or incapacitated? Most self-driving cars are programmed to “hand off” control to the operator if it encounters something it can’t handle, and this has resulted in at least one pedestrian death. In some applications, computer intervention is patently undesirable and can even present safety hazards. Nowadays, it is rare to place a phone call without first having to deal with a computer before you are connected with the person you need to talk to. I don’t know what it costs to hire someone to answer the phone, but it can’t be too expensive to have a human answer the phone. What’s so problematic about a cheerful human voice greeting you when you call a company? We’re talking about an intangible here that money cannot buy: Building trust with a positive first impression, kind of like super neighbors who are always there when you need them. Another example of computer inadequacy is job application software. You upload your résumé and the software “scans” it and fills in the blanks on an application. This would be fine, except the software is far from perfect, and you always have to go back and make a number of corrections. Of course, it’s the applicant’s time wasted here, not the company making the job offer. Here the computer intervention costs more time than it saves. How can something which costs time and money (the initial software purchase price) be justified as a wise purchase? Perhaps it’s the aura of “computerization” at work. The idea that computerization makes everything better. Computerization makes some things better, but not everything. In fact, computer misapplication or flawed implementation can be far worse than no computer at all. Nothing is perfect and most of us understand this, but with a problem computer, the problem gets replicated over and over again, and it can present a real problem. Britt Britt Storkson may be contacted via e-mail to michele@worldwidedrillingresource.com