Please read the attached document below. You may be able to relate in some way to your own experience at work or in your personal life.

Its all the Stupid Computers Fault

Well, another fiscal year has passed for the Piedmont Triad Chapter. This means we are at the beginning of a new year right? Well, what do folks do at the beginning of a calendar year? They make new years resolutions.

A good new years resolution might be to lose weight and get healthy. How does that translate to Supply Chain? We could institutionalize Lean and 5S processes. Or we could make a resolution to fix some bad habit. Hum, this could translate to some 6 Sigma initiatives in supply chain. We have lots of opportunities dont we?

Well, Im going to do something different. Im going to start a be nice to our computers initiative.

How many times have you been at a checkout line in a department store and heard the line Im sorry this computer is so slow today? How many times have you been on the phone with customer service or technical service and heard the same thing? This is despite the fact that nothing has actually changed in the system and it is just as slow (or fast) as it usually is.How many times have you heard from the planning team: If I released all the orders recommended by MRP we would have to build 5 new warehouses to store all the stuff we dont need? Or, how many times have you heard: I have to do forecasting in a spreadsheet because the one generated by the stupid computer is completely wrong! How many times have you been ready to purchase or ship something and someone in person or on the phone says Sorry, the system is wrong. It shows we have inventory but we actually dont. Or, how many times have you looked at a receipt for a sale and noticed that the price of an item is wrong. Whats the sales persons response? Yes, it goes something like this I am sorry but the System is wrong and there is nothing I can do about it.

Its always the stupid computers fault right?

OK, so whats the point? Computers only do what we tell them to do and they only calculate and present data based on what we have entered. You are saying yea, yea, garbage in = garbage out, everyone knows that. Well, we may know it but we sometimes dont live it.

So, this fiscal year I am going to treat every computer as my friend. When I find a problem, Im not going to blame the computer; Im going to gently fix it. Im going to sit back and be patient when someone else is waiting for the screen to change realizing that the computer is doing millions of things millions of times faster than it could have done last year. Im going to believe the plans created by the computer, well, unless something is unrealistic. If it is unrealistic then I am going to find the root cause of the problem and fix it especially if related to data.

Will I be successful? Who knows? Ill probably be sitting here in early August, banging on my keyboard and screaming Whats wrong with this stupid computer!

Please share a story of your own experience considering the following questions:

Q1: When have you experienced some system problem?

Q2: What was the impact on you and / or others?

Q3: What do you think might have caused the problem

Q4: What might have prevented the problem from occurring in the first place?

Consider the topic of this Module and bring in a real life example from your own work or personal life.