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Office Worker Productivity

The Delphi Consulting Group, Inc., (Boston, Massachusetts), a leading electronic document management system and workflow management information system consultant, points to disturbing research in office worker productivity (Reference 1). While information technologies have led to double digit productivity gains on the factory floor, net white collar productivity over the last 20 years has increased less than one percent! While it is true that white collar workers have increased total output, the increase in proportion to expenditures on new office information systems technology has resulted in almost no net gain. This research indicates that information technology has failed to deliver on the promise of office productivity gains. Add to this, noted MIT economist, Lestor Thurow's finding that the industrial global complex is now able to produce 130% of the hardgoods the world can consume (Reference 2). Does this mean that had we succeeded in increasing office productivity, we still would have failed because the world could not absorb the increase? What is the measure for productivity success?

It appears the "more-is-better" measure of productivity is not the best barometer of productivity gains. In the 1970s and 1980s Japanese automobile manufactures did not outsell U.S. automobile manufactures because of their ability to produce more cars. They reacted to the changes in the marketplace, namely the demand for better quality. If productivity and success are measured by the ability to manage change, shouldn't information processing technologies be measured by their ability to help organizations adapt to change?

Managing Change

The basic elements of a business process include people, money, and time. Developing an equation that makes the best use of these basic elements in relation to the market is, and has always been, management's challenge. The 1990s have ushered in a business process renaissance. Driven by world economic events, organizations are redefining and redesigning the way they do business as a means of staying competitive. In the DoD, this means adopting new business models that allow the U.S. to remain militarily superior given a new world order, and its associated impact on the defense budget. Business Process Reengineering (BPR) and Total Quality Management (TQM) are recognized terms that embody this renaissance. Essentially, TQM and BPR are business models that seek to improve service or product quality while simultaneously eliminating or restructuring redundancies and inefficiencies. In effect, TQM and BPR are models that help manage change. Public and private business organizations are employing TQM and BPR models, and because we live in a information society, are implementing Workflow Management Information Systems to assist them. Workflow Management Information Systems are a relatively recent development that evolved from Electronic Document Management Systems (EDMS). Business processes include an exchange of information. Increasingly, this information is in an electronic format. Electronic Document Management Systems allow electronic information in a variety of formats (i.e., documents, forms, databases, drawings, images, video files) to be received, stored, retrieved, and transmitted. Workflow Management Information Systems provide a mechanism to effectively integrate electronic information in the business process and, more importantly, allow for dynamic changes in the information flow.

Workflow Management and the DoD

No other market sector is witnessing more dramatic business process changes than the DoD, particularly in the area of technology acquisition. The mission to be better prepared and technically superior to the former Soviet Union was clearly understood by DoD military and civilian personnel and the contractors who supplied them with products and services. Business models were established for weapons procurement that dictated superior performance first with cost as a dependent variable.

The new business model, recently advanced by Paul Kaminski (Reference 3), Under Secretary of Defense, Acquisition and Technology continues to reflect a strategy of technical superiority, within an affordable budget. This strategy will be implemented by smaller deployable forces and leaner defense support organizations, reduced life cycle costs of weapons systems, acquisition reform, greater reliance of the commercial industrial base, and leveraging our allies' industrial base.

Implementation of the new acquisition business models advanced by Paul Kaminski will be performed by leaner organizations. Leaner organizations are in order due to a sharp reduction in production requirements. The individual tasks required to complete the weapons acquisition process however, most likely will not reflect a corresponding reduction. In fact, at least in the short run, increasingly complex weapons systems, environmental effects, and changing procurement standards may actually increase the number of tasks required to complete an acquisition process. Completing the business acquisition process more efficiently with leaner organizations will require flexible information systems that can adapt to rapid changes in the business process. Information systems that support reduced "time-to-market" and electronic information exchange with the commercial industry will be valued. Workflow Management Information Systems are well suited to these requirements.

Workflow Management Information Systems integrate electronic information to support business processes. Numerous information tools (computer-aided design, imaging, forms processing, databases, spreadsheets, word processors, etc.) support individual tasks, but too often these tools work in isolation from one another. Workflow Management Information Systems connect these discreet information tools in a series of tightly coordinated parallel processes. Information flows in a manner that supports the most efficient method for completing the business process.

DACS Workflow Management Information Systems

Interestingly, the DACS has designed, developed, and successfully implemented Workflow Management Systems long before the term "workflow" was coined. These systems have been literally saving the DoD millions of dollars in the form of time-to-market and labor costs.

The DACS has designed a series of reusable codes that provide users with a workflow development environment. These codes have been packaged and released under the name "OASYS," Open Architecture System. The name is revealing in that the DACS designed these series of codes to support open system standards. Standards such as X-Windows, SQL-compliant databases, "C" and "C++" languages are included within the OASYS design. OASYS includes system administration, forms development, dynamic document routing, auditing, and database integration components.

The DACS has employed OASYS to provide workflow automation for DoD acquisition and technology procurement functions. The DACS has implemented a Procurement Package tracker for the U.S. Army at the Picatinny Arsenal in Dover, New Jersey. This system automates the complex engineering process of weapon certification in preparation for new vendor solicitation requests. The Procurement Package Tracker has been credited with helping the Picatinny Arsenal reduce the time it takes to process Technical Data Packages (TDPs) from an average of 198 days in 1988 to less than 30 days today. During this same period, the Arsenal's TDP error rate dropped from 33 percent to less than 1 percent! At the U.S. Army Watervliet Arsenal, OASYS was used to develop an Automated Acquisition System that routes procurement requests through fund certification, hazardous materials, and concurrence processes. The Defense Technical Information Center (DTIC) is using OASYS to process Technical Area Tasks (TAT) for Information Analysis Center (IAC) Programs. DTIC's TAT Tracker functions include electronically generating Statements of Work, Work Plans, Technical and Cost Proposals, and other supporting documentation, and routing this information through the DoD for required reviews and approvals. The TAT Tracker is expected to drastically reduce the time from a technical task initiation request to task commencement.

"Close Up Corner" in the next DACS Newsletter will take a closer look at the Procurement Package Tracker. We will discuss in more detail the components of the Procurement Package Tracker and how this system is helping the U.S. Army adjust to business process changes.

Reference 1. Delphi Consulting Group, Inc., "Workflow The New Information Systems Infrastructure," 1993.

Reference 2. Koulopoulos, Thomas M. , "The Perpetual Organization", The Delphi Report, October 1994, Vol 1, Issue 6.

Reference 3. Kaminski, Paul G., "Speech Before the Industrial College of the Armed Forces," 27 January 1995.