So this is Part Six the last video in this series of our analysis archeological dig into things we take for granted. As I like to say at the beginning of each of these videos, I recommend to view this set of videos in order as they do build on each other. However there can be viewed independently. Before I get into this next subject, you may have already realized that I believe that humans just like computers are an aspect of design and implementation of an organization. In other words, how something is accomplished. They are system issues, not business or analysis issues.

I'd like to explain this further with a graphic. All organizations rely on external stimuli. In other words, things happening outside their boundaries. For example, a customer requesting something or a fire triggering a fire department in the action or the calendar indicating it's time to send out customer urine summaries. I like to call these things by common Name business events, as they are all events to which some business needs to respond. They're also the reason why organizations are in business.

When an organization responds to an event, they will have some business policy or rules that need to be initiated. This is what an organization does to fill the needs of its customer excetera. So when we as a customer want to purchase a product, the organization has its own policy, or set of rules for accomplishing that purchase. To be able to fulfill the business policy, an organization will design and implement computer systems and or people jobs to apply the business policy in the real world. This is how an organization accomplishes the customer's needs. So in the example of our purchase, we may use an online system via the internet.

Or we could go to a store and have a human do the tasks necessary to provide us with our purchase product. As a customer we always interface with the design and implementation of the organization. We see through how an organization is designed and implemented. When we put our analysts hat on, we've been doing that to a large degree in this series of videos. using another example, we can see this implementation versus business issue. When we interface with a bank as a customer, our business needs in other words, what we want to do maybe such things as deposit funds, withdraw funds, and transfer funds, etc.

We can do our banking business transactions with the bank's different implementations. In other words, how we accomplish our needs using a human Teller, an automated teller, or even a mobile device. As a customer, we're interested in accomplishing our needs, how we do it is secondary, but nonetheless important as we find out when an organization puts obstacles in the way or makes it difficult to accomplish our needs with a poor design. Now, let's get back to the dig. I found another artifact in the business world that ends up affecting us as customers. And that's the department budget organization, you can also replace the word department with Office division bureau or any other human partitioning.

This subject is really a follow on to the reason why we end up in the historical situation of Industrial Age computer system structures that get in the way of efficiently accomplishing the customers need his billing accounts department again, only now he's being promoted and has a budget for his department. He's overloaded with work. So he calls the information system department or is it vendor for help with a custom computer system for his department? Now, suppose I put my business analyst hat on and I interview Bert based on his request, and I find that a document leaves Bill's department and comes back later, with just a check mark on it. I say to Bill, if I follow this document into the other department that puts the checkmark on it. I could improve the flow of the document and give better service to the customer.

What do you think bill says, Hey, that sounds department don't study Sally's area on my budget. If she wants a new system, she can pay for it on our own budget, not mine. So some information systems is it people and certainly packaged software vendors perpetuated all boundaries when they built computer systems or sold systems to department managers. It can get worse when a pre programmed generalized software package is purchased. And the business tries to match their needs to the package, then use another example that may bring this a little closer to home. I have my own business.

So I pay myself when I choose, actually when there's anything left over after office costs. But if you work for an organization, let me ask you a question. When do you get paid weekly and monthly? Do any of you get paid in real time? I mean, when you decide you want to be paid? Probably not.

I bought my own house a few years ago, and I would sometimes get someone wandering onto the job site asking if I had any work they could do that I'd look around and say, Well, you could Get that shovel and move that pile of dirt over there and level it out. When they finish, they might say, okay, it's done. Can you let me have a few dollars for lunch? If I said pay days a week on Thursday, I probably would have been hit with the shovel. It was real time payroll on the job site for everyone. So why do we have batch payroll in the typical organization?

Well, I have one explanation. Many years ago, I used to be responsible for the computer payroll system in a large company. The computer system ran in batch mode every two weeks. This was because in the old days, the staff in the payroll department used to take two weeks to stop payroll envelopes with actual cash and then sort the envelope for distribution to the various departments. When this process was replaced with a computer system, we didn't ask the employees which were the payroll systems real customers, when they wanted to prepay. It was obvious that the system should run on the same two week schedule, even though it didn't take two weeks to run the computer program.

Funny thing was anyone could leave the company in the middle of the payroll cycle, and we could accommodate a short paycheck easily. Today, a standard laptop can run payroll for an average company. But we still typically have batch payroll systems. Do you think it might have something to do with perpetuated payroll time periods, and the purchase of vendor payroll systems and services? Of course, this is only a problem for the customer, the employee who needs some money before payday, because that never happens. Right?

So all department boundaries and their schedules get perpetuated. Okay, be careful what you perpetuate. Now, what's the result of all these historical wrong turns? If old human and computer system boundaries and files are perpetuated, organizations end up with inefficient overly complex systems, which is bad news for its customers. Then we use what I hope is a worst case example. In the real world often disjoint manual and computer systems have to be pieced together.

Other to accomplish a customer's need. This image is trying to show that we have disjoint departments and systems, each one sometimes having its own files and databases. Remember, there has to be a file between every boundary being a human file or a computer database. This will slow down the response to the customers need. Many times a false stimulus such as a time of day, or beginning of a human shift will stimulate each one of these disjoint human and computer systems interaction when the real stimulus is the customer request. This structure sets up walls, sometimes physical, sometimes logical walls, which a customer's request has to traverse.

What's worse, often each department and even system will double check and read it it's simple just in case the left department made an error causing even more delay for those privy to the internals of the typical organization. This image should look quite familiar. Also, we have a boss subordinate hierarchy above these human systems, and sometimes a system and program architecture hierarchy in computer systems, this structure causes customer delays, not to mention office politics, and many times leaves customers frustrated wondering what's the problem? And why is it taking so long to do something that doesn't seem difficult if they had to do it themselves? Maybe this structure made sense for an industrialized society, but not for an information a society. Remember my corruption of Newton's first law of motion.

A customer's request or impetus, like a body motion wants to stay in motion until impeded by some resistance, ie non natural boundary? Well, the old structures and hierarchy are unnatural boundaries. They are the old design that slows down the response to a customer's need, namely asked as we deal with an organization with the structure, so even management structures get perpetuated. Again, be careful what you perpetuate. All the problems I've mentioned so far are avoided when an organized builds it's human and computer systems and even its internal structure around its customers needs and not the old internal structure of the past. Let me say that again, I believe the system and structure of an organization should be based on what it goes for its customers, not what has always been there in the past, or what every other company seems to be doing, replacing the industrial age hierarchy.

I believe business facilitators should manage one or more complete customer needs with teams of human and or computer systems. If you're thinking a customer focus structure like this can't work in anything but a small organization. Let me say I've taught these concepts to many large public and private sector organizations. For example, years ago, I had the pleasure of teaching my ideas to hundreds of business and Information Systems staff had the package delivery company Federal Express, the internal structure was streamlined. To get a customer package through the organization as fast as possible. FedEx employs 10s of things.

Thousands of employees with a streamlined structure for package delivery that guarantees overnight delivery. Of course, they didn't need me to tell them how to structure their systems, it was already obvious to them. They just didn't perpetuate the systems model that the other package delivery companies were using. And there were quite a few of them already in business. Okay, it's time for a wrap up. Basically, I want you to remember that everything you see is the design.

The design, you see could be nature's design and what is required to continue the world or a human design and what is required to satisfy human need. In the business world, what you see is the design and implementation characteristics of something that satisfies some business or analysis requirements. There's an obvious statement to say that every human based or computer based system was designed and then implemented, using whatever human and computer implementation technology was available at the time the system was built. But many times as I've tried to show in this video series, it was just perpetuate But best with a new technological interface without an analysis of the organization, or restructuring to become customer focus. As I hoped I've shown with these videos we should see through in question any old designs with our analysis at all, even questioning organizational structures, taking a customer focused point of view will greatly help all organizations build better human and computer systems, something that should help make all our lives easier.

So what can you take away from this set of videos, if you're a manager or system developer in the business world, when you get the opportunity, don't fall into the trap of perpetuating all designs, and don't accept things that seem illogical just because that's the way they've always been. If you're a customer don't accept poor service from organizations to put barriers in the way and don't accept silly comments and excuses such as that's not my department. It's in the computer system and can't be changed, or that's how we've always done it. That's our company policy. As a customer, you are the ones that should really guide and organization systems and structure. Stay quiet, nothing will change.

If you're confronted with an archaic Industrial Age organization, well, worst case, send them this video. However, as a customer, please do praise good service and systems are usually no accident. I've worked on many projects and the good systems that result took a lot of work and cooperation. So again, if and when you get the opportunity, make a difference, improve the world, even if it's just the business world. I hope you found these videos interesting and informative. They took me some effort to produce obviously there's a methodology that goes with the concepts in this set of videos, which I've been teaching to organizations for decades.

Even though large organizations find most benefits from my methodology. It's just as valid if you own a run a small or startup business. That's where my ideas easiest implement. I'd like to teach you a lot more. So to learn more More about how you can create human and computer systems and business structure that focuses on its customers without falling into the trap of perpetuating or designed. Take a look at the books and videos available on my websites that will show you how or if you already like my ideas and follow the link below to my company website WWW dot logical conclusions inc.com my analysis training Website www business analysis videos calm.

I'm Brian Dickinson Thank you for watching these videos. Please hit the like button so I can get some feedback and share and recommend these videos to colleagues and friends.