THE WELCH COMPANY
440 Davis Court #1602
San Francisco, CA 94111-2496
415 781 5700


S U M M A R Y


DIARY: November 3, 1993 10:39 AM Wednesday; Rod Welch

Russ called on evaluation of SDS.

1...Summary/Objective


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CONTACTS 
0201 - Knecht, Haley, Lawrence & Smith    415 896 6930 fax 0818
020101 - Mr. Russ Bryson; Systems Administrator; Administration
0202 - Knecht, Haley, Lawrence & Smith    415 896 6930 fax 0818
020201 - Ms. Anne M. Bevington, Esquire

SUBJECTS
KHLS SDS Trial, General, Evaluation
Learning time/difficulty
User Interface, Menus, Mouse, Speech

0605 -    ..
0606 - Summary/Objective
0607 -
060701 - Russ said he met with Anne and another attorney yesterday, and they
060702 - completed KHLS' evaluation of SDS, concluding it is not easy enough to
060703 - use.  Russ and I will meet this afternoon, after which he will submit
060704 - a report of KHLS findings.
060705 -
060706 - He asked me to pick up the loander monitor; I will do it tomorrow.
060707 -
060708 -
060709 -  ..
0608 -
0609 -
0610 - Discussion
0611 -
061101 - Russ said SDS "...is not ready for prime time," and indicated KHLS has
061102 - concluded the value of the time required to learn SDS, exceeds the
061103 - benefits of using it; or at best, the benefits of SDS are not suffici-
061104 - ently greater than the cost of learning it, to justify the effort.
061105 - Russ said if the program were easier to learn, KHLS would consider it
061106 - further.
061107 -
061108 - He wants to meet at 1600, as previously scheduled for training, to
061109 - explain his concerns, using the program on-line.  He will then prepare
061110 - an evaluation report of the KHLS findings.
061111 -
061112 - I will pick up the loaner monitor tomorrow or Friday, at the latest
061113 - since Russ will be out of the office tomorrow.
061114 -
061115 -
061116 -
061117 -
0612 -
0613 -
0614 - 1107 called Anne
0615 -
061501 - Anne said Russ told her it would take a lot of his time to learn SDS
061502 - because the User interface is not intuitive.  KHLS feels Russ should
061503 - not devote further time to SDS, since he needs to focus on his regular
061504 - work.  Anne said there was also some grumbling in the office about
061505 - Russ having a color monitor, when no one else has one.
061506 -
061507 - Anne said Users want simplicity and ease of use, and recommended
061508 - greater effort to achieve that objective.  I explained we have been
061509 - working a great deal on this (e.g. Help, menus, mouse, controlled
061510 - visibility windows), and cited Russ' comment that the program is much
061511 - easier to use now than when he saw it several years ago, see ref SDS 5
061512 - line 158.  I explained improvements come from working with custom-
061513 - ers, like KHLS, as I provide support to transition them into more
061514 - productive practices.  I thanked Anne for sponsoring the evaluation
061515 - and of SDS and offering her ideas.
061516 -
061517 - I explained that part of the "ease of use" question, is value, per
061518 - analysis at ref SDS 5 line 164.
061519 -
061520 -     Anne said KHLS found SDS accomplishes valuable tasks, but unlike
061521 -     programs like Wordperfect and Lotus 123, SDS does not improve
061522 -     productivity enough to justify the cost of acquiring new skills.
061523 -
061524 -
061525 - Anne said she would like to see the program again after further
061526 - improvements are made.
061527 -
061528 -
061529 -
061530 -
0616 -
0617 -
0618 - Analysis - Cost/Benefit
0619 -
061901 - While SDS is difficult to learn, so is the alphabet.  People spend 12
061902 - years learning to use it because the community "believes" the invest-
061903 - ment in learning time will pay off.  So difficulty per se is not the
061904 - issue.  It is rather perceived value v. cost.  If you have strong
061905 - belief (i.e. "faith") that an action, like learning a new skill (e.g.
061906 - law, engineering, carpentry, piano, etc.) will result in a big payoff,
061907 - then the effort is made.  For example, if high profile executives,
061908 - lawyers, etc., reported that SDS greatly improves the ability to
061909 - represent clients and win cases, but that this is not apparent until
061910 - you learn to use it, there would be sufficient credibility in obtain-
061911 - ing an adequate reward, that the learning curve would be welcomed, as
061912 - an opportunity to do something that really improves performance. Since
061913 - this track record is lacking with SDS, all of the benefits are
061914 - prospective and so are overwhelmed by the pain of immediate costs.
061915 - There is no faith that SDS will improve the lives and incomes of the
061916 - people at KHLS, which is the intent of SDS.  Without faith, there is
061917 - no driving force to invest in learning, see analysis at ref SDS 1 line
061918 - 235.
061919 -
061920 - So we have to keep trying to create the track record, while improving
061921 - ease of use.
061922 -
061923 - The haste of this decision leaves open the prospect that office poli-
061924 - tics vis a vis Russ having a color monitor, may have precipitated an
061925 - expedited review, rather than a careful analysis, as might occur if
061926 - Anne were considering a legal arugment.  Anne may have been asked to
061927 - justify the thing, and rather than cite the record, Russ was asked to
061928 - demonstrate what SDS does that justifies him having a color monitor.
061929 - Russ has no SDS skills and no experience with it, there was no data to
061930 - show how SDS works, so all they could do was say what it can do, while
061931 - people looked at strange screens.
061932 -
061933 - If Russ' office were situated so the monitor were no not so apparent,
061934 - we might still be in business.
061935 -
061936 - I wonder to what extent the memos I have submitted heightened concern
061937 - by Russ that he might be expected to apply the program as I do.  He
061938 - asked the other day how long I spend writing reports, and this was
061939 - addressed at ref SDS 6 line 80, setting out how writing is the
061940 - "Perform" component in the POIMS trilogy:
061941 -
061942 -
061943 -            +--> Plan --------------------> Perform ----+
061944 -            |                                           |
061945 -            |                                           |
061946 -            |                                           |
061947 -            +----------------- Report <-----------------+
061948 -
061949 -
061950 - If the sole problem were getting Russ' regular chores done, I could do
061951 - something about that.  We could provide help, stretch out the evalua-
061952 - tion period.  There is no requirement that this evaluation be con-
061953 - cluded within a certain time.  Except, it appears the monitor situa-
061954 - tion placed an artificial demand that an immediate decision be taken.
061955 -
061956 -
061957 -
0620 -
Distribution. . . . See "CONTACTS"