Summer is going along great but it is passing us by way too fast, or so it seems. As I wrote earlier, we traveled a fair amount in June and attended a couple of weddings. In one of the weddings, there were events for 4 days which was exciting, but we were tired. I have a lot of golfing to catch up on. I have been helping out with a couple of software projects as well as co-write a report on the symposium we held in the Spring – “Liberal Arts Learning in the Digital Age”. And then, wanted to get a good handle on how well we did in the past year financially. By our count, we did great. However, the system of record – Banner, says otherwise. That provided some summer drama for a few hours/days until we sorted them all out and all is well.

I also spent considerable amount of time calling AT&T trying to get credit ($60) for mistakes that they made in my bill. This happens every time we go on an international trip. In reality, you should be able to manage all of this on the web, but you can’t. You can certainly do all activities on the web that brings in money for the companies. But you cannot do anything like requesting credit online with proper explanation, that their agents can then either approve or reject based on its merit. You have to call! And you have to remember some 4 digit code, which I don’t because I rarely make calls. They then send it through text that you have to punch in and then change. You punch in your phone number, zip code and last four digits of your social security number only to be told that for security reasons I need to recite the whole thing again to the agent. Then rewind and state the problem all over. I did this six times. One good soul REALLY understood the issue and then I lost the connection (which I honestly believe AT&T arranges) just when I thought I was getting through. Thankfully, he called back and assured me that he will issue the credit in 48 hours. I thanked him profusely and waited for 96 hours, because I know that the companies don’t like to part with money. But I found no credit. Last thursday, while stuck in traffic due to heavy rains, all determined to sort this out, I made the call and told the woman at the other end my frustration and asked for a supervisor. She told me that she will be happy to pass it on if she cannot solve the problem. All it took was 5 minutes. She understood, issued the credit, and sent a confirmation email. I am happy to report that the credit came through.

Whether it is the year end reconciliation issues in Banner or the AT&T inefficiencies, I blame the software “systems” that are simply broken!

These systems are extremely hard to design & build because it is very difficult to anticipate how they are going to be used. The population that uses them varies widely in how they use the systems. In the rush to get the systems out many of these are distributed way earlier than they should, causing pain and suffering. These systems are supposed to help increase efficiency and productivity, instead they end up in overall inefficiencies. Then the endless patch work begins in an attempt to salvage a bad product and users are asked to adjust to the software, which, especially when I pay for it, is something I hate to do.

One approach, which is very costly to do, is to say, let us build it, open it up for users, learn from it, and then rebuild it based on that experience and leave it alone for a while! Or better yet, build them like cars – though the look and feel of cars and efficiencies have increased tremendously over the years, the essential components of what a user does has not changed. OK, if you are type who likes to fiddle with it and repair them, you will complain about how everything is covered up and computerized, but you are a very tiny majority. And then provide features and options only when needed. You are under control for purchasing decisions – no one can force you to buy it just because it is old (well, if you are in Singapore, this may not be an option, but then again, they don’t want you to own a car in the first place).

Obviously there are very few good systems. I would say Apple OS is one of them. The basic look and feel has not changed much despite vast improvements in performance. In other words, the Finder has looked and acted like it has always been, but the number of options that are available to you has increased multiple fold (such as multiple desktops, Mission Control which has replaced Expose and Spaces etc.). But most of these are not forced on you – they are there as free options for you to use if you want to. The fact that the underlying operating system is Unix has provided Apple to do its magic like the car analogy. They picked up a good operating system built by and for the systems type folks and built a brilliant front end for common users. The underlying operating system has changed numerous times and you are driving a prettier and faster car just the same way you have always done!

Microsoft OS and ERPs fall in the category of  broken systems in my mind. They have decided to take a different approach. They have left the engine of the car to be the same old same old for the most part and keep trying to pretty up the car and build around the older (and in my opinion outdated) technologies. And every time there is an upgrade, you really pay for it, not just in buying the software, but in terms of learning the new interfaces.

ERPs are even worse. Because of backward compatibility and other issues, the core remains the same. In both of these cases the fact that we are being forced to change our business practices to suit the software is at the least annoying and at the worst makes one’s blood boil. We  literally spend hundreds of thousands of dollars into these systems, including the human resources, and have to run critical processes such as registration according to these systems. And, believe it or not, even after some of the field lengths have increased, Banner is still unable to accommodate some of the critical information. For example, some of the titles of the named positions are too long for Banner to accommodate. What are we to do? Make sure that these names are carefully chosen to fit 80 characters (or whatever the silly limit is)? Come on, now! We an complain and we might get a sympathetic ear or two, but the system is so broken, no one can fix it. If they increase the field length, who knows how many other things will fall apart.

This is exactly how I felt about my call to AT&T. Frankly, they are doing something creative and useful for once – they have hired several veterans to answer customer questions. So, when I call and I don’t get anywhere with them, I control myself and don’t get upset with the person at the other end. Because, I know that the system they have in place for these “problem solvers” is not much different than what I see on the web. It is broken. The language used is useless and the information provided in detail is the least that I am interested in. Frankly the only thing I can easily understand is the bolded big dollar amount! They have a live chat, but the person at the other end cannot help you with your bills. I would rather have a nice chat with someone I know than a stranger who thanks me every line (I think it is a bot of sorts) and is practically useless. You have to call and go through all silliness and wait for 6 minutes or so to get someone who then is presented with a broken system.

For ERPs, this is precisely why I favor the approach we have taken. We need them. If our only option for a car is an expensive prettied up one with really old engines, we will have no choice but to buy them because we need to get to places. Similarly, we need those ERPs to conduct business and store data etc. But, for essential things like accessing data, find other ways to do business. Like, drive the car only to get to some place where you can take a mass transit or ride a bicycle. For eg., if a business process such as registration is critically important for us to do differently than what these ERPs impose on us, let us find an Apple like solution – a well thought of, sustainable long term solution that can still store the data in the ERP in such a way that everything will still work fine. Let us not be hostages of broken systems.

I am sure that the woman who understood my predicament and gave me the credit has a way around the broken system!