At DATAForge we pride ourselves on designing simple, elegant, easy to use, web based software for a manufacturing demographic that has been flooded with overly complicated software, abound with options and restrictions, screens to control those options,restrictions and configurations. I’m tired of it. I don’t want you to get me wrong, there is certainly a time, place, and need for software that is configurable in every conceviable way. For example when a multi-state and international corporation is required by law to comply with one of the most complicated tax codes in the recorded history of Earth, then you get a pass for making an application complicated. In this case complication can and has saved many organizations millions or hundreds of millions of dollars, issues like The Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002 are not to be taken lightly.
The same logic of presenting every imaginable, option, configuration, button, screen, step, radio button, piece of information has been applied to many software packages. You would think in a large organization, simplicity would be king…not so…I am currently consulting with a large multi-national organization to help in the deploymentof a centralized system to house all product information for their MRO or Maintenance, Repair and Operations. Which, in practical terms, means that they are centralizing their databases of information required to order, maintain, and use any item that can potentially be purchased but does not go into their final product.
Not a small task by any measuring stick. Master Data Management, data cleansing, data normalization, intra-organization de-duplication are on the radar of most if not all large businesses. The most important part of the process is to choose application(s) that are the best fit for your organization, not the one that is made or owned by the largest company, and not the one who has the most clever marketing, not the one that appears in the latest report by the best marketed research firm (think about the ratings agencies who rated toxic subrime mortgage backed securities AA or AAA)
The software that was chosen xxxxxx (contractually obligated not to say the name) has one main screen for entering most of the data related to any given item, this screen contains no less than 50 possible fields in tabular form. There are also 3 additional screen each with less than 50 fields for data entry, these subsequent screens are used to associate ansillary information such as pictures to an item. The screens that DATAForge uses – one screen with 25 or less (depending on the type of data). The remainder of the information is gathered organically and seamlessly based on the way the application is used and who is using it.
When we design a solution the question on each team members mind is “How can I make this easier and faster to do for the end user?”
When evaluating an application force the vendor to show you how it will be used (not tell you), make them show you their solution is faster and more efficient. Lots of options, inputs, and fields are not always the users friend.
Tags: DATAForge, maintenance, manufacturing, masterdata, MRO, Software as a Service, Technology
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