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Planning for office automation
Planningforoffice automation
by TOM
I
n a growing number of organizations, office automation is not merely important for administrative efficiency but is also of strategic importance in terms of the future course of the business. Office automation may, thus, be vital in opening up new business opportunities. However, unless the adoption and installation of office automation systems are carefully planned, benefits, both in terms of efficiency and future business opportunities, will be lost. Planning for office automation involves two major issues: l
l
strategic issues - where should the organization and its office automation programme be going? tactical issues - how does the organization move toward its strategic objectives?
Planning at the strategic level will focus on the business objectives of the organization and the broad opportunities office automation offers for furthering these objectives. The plan deals with ‘top down’ issues such asinvestAbstract: Office automationmy not necessarily yield any of the benefitscommonly believed toaccompany its use, unlessadequate planning is carried out. The article discusses the twolevels of planning which are required fm ojjice systems:strategicplanning and tacticalplanning. Such planning activities, apartfrom helping to achieve beta&s, also promoteevolutionand organizational learning.
Keywords: office automatim, strategic planning, tacticalplanning. Tom Stewart is a consultant Concepts Ltd.
10
with System
0011-684X/83/080010-02$03.00
0
ment patterns, development priorities and system policy. At the tactical level, the focus is on the specific system opportunities and the resources and procedures involved in producing worthwhile systems. This is often called the ‘bottom up’ approach. Any planning process must combine both approaches. It is the linking of these two requirements that distinguishes the good plan from a worthless paper exercise.
Strategic planning
1983 Butterworth
& Co (Publishers)
The second problem is that there is some confusion over the difference between tactics and strategy. Normally strategy is what we are trying to achieve and tactics are how we achieve it. A plan can of course cover both. However, it is all too common for office systems plans to focus solely on tactics and ignore the strategy. The key strategic issues cover the following: The business terprise. The
The planning process can probably start at either end but starting with the top down phase makes it easier to avoid becoming bogged down in dayto-day operational issues. Indeed in some organizations, especially in the financial and service sector, computer technology is of strategic importance. The decisions a bank makes today about computer networks are not just a question of administrative efficiency but they significantly affect the direction and nature of the business. In such organizations, office systems planning must be linked to the overall information systems strategy. This in turn is a subset, perhaps the critical subset, of the total business strategy. Although many people would agree with this objective, two problems prevent it from being achieved in practice. The first problem is that although most enterprises can claim to have a clear business strategy, which includes information systems, rather fewer can produce the document describing it or be certain that it has been properly communicated to, and understood by, all relevant personnel.
Ltd.
STEWART
target
objectives
of the en-
areas for office sys-
tems . The levels and patterns ment. The priorities
of invest-
for the business.
The policy on coherence. What level should corporate standards address? What is the trade off between scale and individuality? The policy on centralization. The systems department has a vital role in creating an awareness of the potential targets for office systems and in marshalling the technical arguments for and against coherence and centralization. However the strategy issues are primarily top management issues and should be discussed and resolved at that level. The strategic plan covers all these points and provides the overall direction which the tactical plan supports.
Tactical planning The tactical plan is also a management
data processing
tool and musr relate directly to the shorter term, more pragmatic, practical requirements. It is where the bottom up requirements meet the top down strategy. It too should be produced by cooperation berween management and the systems department. It should contain the following sections: Business objectives The business objectives served by the plan should be clearly stated and obviously relevant to the business. ff it is difficult to identify these or state them clearly then perhaps the proposed applications are not worth doing. Applications The early applications should be chosen carefully, The:y should be at an operational level, easy to cost-justify, simple, well designed and likely to sucteed. Conrrols, pr~~~~~~~~Lznd~et~ds ~~~t~~at~o~~
of
The strategy will have laid down general guidelines on the way applications are justified and controlled. The plan elaborates on these and sets out agreed procedures for the acquisition and use of equipment. Selected pilots A limited number of pilots should be planned to explore more radical but potentially more significant opportunities, The pilots should be regarded as prototypes and should have major potential for the organization as a whole. The sites shou.ld be chosen to be visible, credible and we11supported by a co~itted m~agement. The initial state and the pilot should be systematically measured to ensure that the results can be quantified reliably. Technical resources This section should cover the capabilities of known products, both hardware and software, and of the systems staff to develop and support applications. User resources and training This section should cover the various resources avaifable to the users which
~0125no 8 october 1983
can be applied to office systems. Experience already gamed from word processing and from micros is often far more extensive than the systems department realises. User education and training are both important if the technology is to yield the best results. Beginning with a general awareness of the technology, training should then become specific, for individual applications ’ Finally, any requirements for commu~~at~ons interfaces need to be incorporated into the plan. In many cases the plan will include future requirements, although the immediate applications may be quite adequately met with self-contained systems.
Responsibility for planning Clearly planning is an activity which requires considerable cooperation between users, management and systems and a combination of skills, inciuding DP, O&M and general management ability. To create the right mix a number of businesses have approached the problem by setting up an office automation department or working party who then set out to identify what needs to be done. Plausible though this sounds, it is the reverse of established good management practice. Manning is too important to leave to a committee. No one group can cover all the issues, instead a strong individual with sufficient credibility and commitment may be able to carry the plan through, although he/she will almost certainly be supPrted by a committee Setting up an organization should be the last step in the process and only undertaken once it is clear what the requirements are, otherwise the office system team may join forces with the suppliers in seeking out ways the busineSS can use Office ‘ystems - few businesses can make money out of that activity (apart from the suppliers). One approach is to appoint or second an individual to be responsible for pIarming the use of information
technology in genera1 (,or office systerns in particular). The individual should report to the direcor in charge of systems or management services but should be able to cross organizational boundaries. It is particularly important that such a person has the capabilicy to grow with the job. Far too many companies retitled the word processing manager ‘the office systems manager’ only to discover tha? their horizons were still restricted to word processing. The various elements of the planning process outlined above are idealized and seldom occur in exactly the same way twice. They are certainly not rigid requirements or cie;tr cut steps which will inevitably lead the organiztion to success. However, the organizational process of producing and reviewing a plan is essential in my view to the success of office systems and indeed other similar technologies. Without effective planning we either fail to achieve any real benefits at all (a result common to ill-conceived electronic mail trials) or else we very rapidiy achieve benefits but then spend many years paying for them with horrendous costs in maintenance, support and in extricating ourselves from inappropriate technology (common with over-enthusiastic :swarms of micros). The final plan, or set of plans, may bear Bittle relationship to what was originally conceived1 but the process of producing it will prove an essential experience for all concerned No plan can guarantee success, althou~ a good one can greatly reduce the chances of a costly and damaging failure. Even when office .mtomation ventures have been successful, that success may not be properly appreciated and the valuable lessons learned not fully applied t~rougho~it the organization. There is thereflare a continuing need for planning activities to promote evolution and. organizational learning. 0 -----_ System Concepts Ltd, Museum House, Magi Street. Londun WClA 11T. UK. Tel: 01-636S912.
11
by TOM
I
n a growing number of organizations, office automation is not merely important for administrative efficiency but is also of strategic importance in terms of the future course of the business. Office automation may, thus, be vital in opening up new business opportunities. However, unless the adoption and installation of office automation systems are carefully planned, benefits, both in terms of efficiency and future business opportunities, will be lost. Planning for office automation involves two major issues: l
l
strategic issues - where should the organization and its office automation programme be going? tactical issues - how does the organization move toward its strategic objectives?
Planning at the strategic level will focus on the business objectives of the organization and the broad opportunities office automation offers for furthering these objectives. The plan deals with ‘top down’ issues such asinvestAbstract: Office automationmy not necessarily yield any of the benefitscommonly believed toaccompany its use, unlessadequate planning is carried out. The article discusses the twolevels of planning which are required fm ojjice systems:strategicplanning and tacticalplanning. Such planning activities, apartfrom helping to achieve beta&s, also promoteevolutionand organizational learning.
Keywords: office automatim, strategic planning, tacticalplanning. Tom Stewart is a consultant Concepts Ltd.
10
with System
0011-684X/83/080010-02$03.00
0
ment patterns, development priorities and system policy. At the tactical level, the focus is on the specific system opportunities and the resources and procedures involved in producing worthwhile systems. This is often called the ‘bottom up’ approach. Any planning process must combine both approaches. It is the linking of these two requirements that distinguishes the good plan from a worthless paper exercise.
Strategic planning
1983 Butterworth
& Co (Publishers)
The second problem is that there is some confusion over the difference between tactics and strategy. Normally strategy is what we are trying to achieve and tactics are how we achieve it. A plan can of course cover both. However, it is all too common for office systems plans to focus solely on tactics and ignore the strategy. The key strategic issues cover the following: The business terprise. The
The planning process can probably start at either end but starting with the top down phase makes it easier to avoid becoming bogged down in dayto-day operational issues. Indeed in some organizations, especially in the financial and service sector, computer technology is of strategic importance. The decisions a bank makes today about computer networks are not just a question of administrative efficiency but they significantly affect the direction and nature of the business. In such organizations, office systems planning must be linked to the overall information systems strategy. This in turn is a subset, perhaps the critical subset, of the total business strategy. Although many people would agree with this objective, two problems prevent it from being achieved in practice. The first problem is that although most enterprises can claim to have a clear business strategy, which includes information systems, rather fewer can produce the document describing it or be certain that it has been properly communicated to, and understood by, all relevant personnel.
Ltd.
STEWART
target
objectives
of the en-
areas for office sys-
tems . The levels and patterns ment. The priorities
of invest-
for the business.
The policy on coherence. What level should corporate standards address? What is the trade off between scale and individuality? The policy on centralization. The systems department has a vital role in creating an awareness of the potential targets for office systems and in marshalling the technical arguments for and against coherence and centralization. However the strategy issues are primarily top management issues and should be discussed and resolved at that level. The strategic plan covers all these points and provides the overall direction which the tactical plan supports.
Tactical planning The tactical plan is also a management
data processing
tool and musr relate directly to the shorter term, more pragmatic, practical requirements. It is where the bottom up requirements meet the top down strategy. It too should be produced by cooperation berween management and the systems department. It should contain the following sections: Business objectives The business objectives served by the plan should be clearly stated and obviously relevant to the business. ff it is difficult to identify these or state them clearly then perhaps the proposed applications are not worth doing. Applications The early applications should be chosen carefully, The:y should be at an operational level, easy to cost-justify, simple, well designed and likely to sucteed. Conrrols, pr~~~~~~~~Lznd~et~ds ~~~t~~at~o~~
of
The strategy will have laid down general guidelines on the way applications are justified and controlled. The plan elaborates on these and sets out agreed procedures for the acquisition and use of equipment. Selected pilots A limited number of pilots should be planned to explore more radical but potentially more significant opportunities, The pilots should be regarded as prototypes and should have major potential for the organization as a whole. The sites shou.ld be chosen to be visible, credible and we11supported by a co~itted m~agement. The initial state and the pilot should be systematically measured to ensure that the results can be quantified reliably. Technical resources This section should cover the capabilities of known products, both hardware and software, and of the systems staff to develop and support applications. User resources and training This section should cover the various resources avaifable to the users which
~0125no 8 october 1983
can be applied to office systems. Experience already gamed from word processing and from micros is often far more extensive than the systems department realises. User education and training are both important if the technology is to yield the best results. Beginning with a general awareness of the technology, training should then become specific, for individual applications ’ Finally, any requirements for commu~~at~ons interfaces need to be incorporated into the plan. In many cases the plan will include future requirements, although the immediate applications may be quite adequately met with self-contained systems.
Responsibility for planning Clearly planning is an activity which requires considerable cooperation between users, management and systems and a combination of skills, inciuding DP, O&M and general management ability. To create the right mix a number of businesses have approached the problem by setting up an office automation department or working party who then set out to identify what needs to be done. Plausible though this sounds, it is the reverse of established good management practice. Manning is too important to leave to a committee. No one group can cover all the issues, instead a strong individual with sufficient credibility and commitment may be able to carry the plan through, although he/she will almost certainly be supPrted by a committee Setting up an organization should be the last step in the process and only undertaken once it is clear what the requirements are, otherwise the office system team may join forces with the suppliers in seeking out ways the busineSS can use Office ‘ystems - few businesses can make money out of that activity (apart from the suppliers). One approach is to appoint or second an individual to be responsible for pIarming the use of information
technology in genera1 (,or office systerns in particular). The individual should report to the direcor in charge of systems or management services but should be able to cross organizational boundaries. It is particularly important that such a person has the capabilicy to grow with the job. Far too many companies retitled the word processing manager ‘the office systems manager’ only to discover tha? their horizons were still restricted to word processing. The various elements of the planning process outlined above are idealized and seldom occur in exactly the same way twice. They are certainly not rigid requirements or cie;tr cut steps which will inevitably lead the organiztion to success. However, the organizational process of producing and reviewing a plan is essential in my view to the success of office systems and indeed other similar technologies. Without effective planning we either fail to achieve any real benefits at all (a result common to ill-conceived electronic mail trials) or else we very rapidiy achieve benefits but then spend many years paying for them with horrendous costs in maintenance, support and in extricating ourselves from inappropriate technology (common with over-enthusiastic :swarms of micros). The final plan, or set of plans, may bear Bittle relationship to what was originally conceived1 but the process of producing it will prove an essential experience for all concerned No plan can guarantee success, althou~ a good one can greatly reduce the chances of a costly and damaging failure. Even when office .mtomation ventures have been successful, that success may not be properly appreciated and the valuable lessons learned not fully applied t~rougho~it the organization. There is thereflare a continuing need for planning activities to promote evolution and. organizational learning. 0 -----_ System Concepts Ltd, Museum House, Magi Street. Londun WClA 11T. UK. Tel: 01-636S912.
11