David H. Rothman

“ United held the three-day course in a windowless conference room on the second floor of the research center in East Hartford, Connecticut, just across the river from corporate headquarters. Blowups of IBM computer equipment lined a wall. It was as though United were doing all it could to engender concentration. If an executive turned to gaze at a nonexistent window, the sight of the photographs might gently nudge him back to work. ”

“ Consider typing pools—er, centralized word-processing operations. If not passé, they at least deserve to be; most, anyway. Employees’ salaries keep rising, even with slowed-down inflation, while the price of computers is falling. By the end of this decade an average worker’s salary may exceed $20,000 annually. And yet micros and dedicated word processors will easily cost less than several thousand dollars. Even now, for a typical business, Barry says, centralized word processing simply doesn’t pay; it tears the employee away from his or her boss and harms the managers’ own work. ”

“ Murphy, now a computer security consultant, wisely observes: “You’re safe from average crooks—they don’t envision a nice, mild-mannered human being working at anything more than a souped-up typewriter. But you can never, never be able to 100 percent secure a computer system. Even the most trusted user could say, ‘F— the damn payroll,’ and destroy your records.” ”

“ I thought of Leibo and Darlene when I read of the Grid Compass executive computer and its original $10,000 price. It might be a splendid machine, but what a waste of money in many cases. The money instead might go to buy the right screens and keyboards for subordinates. So often the difference is just a few hundred dollars, if it exists at all. Don’t give your employees a say in the selection of equipment and then restrict their choices through unreasonable penny-pinching. If you can’t do it the right way immediately, maybe you should wait before you computerize. ”

“ Pacing isn’t just monitoring, after all. The work is electronically moving past the worker as if it’s on a factory conveyer belt. Think of all the lemons Detroit put on the road in its eagerness for new production records. “With older workers the error rate isn’t as high,” Smith says of white-collar jobs paced by machines. “Maybe it has to do with the nervousness of young people. Older workers always report more job satisfaction. They become used to the drudgery. It’s a hell of a way to put it, but that’s what happens.” Not that many older workers love machine pacing, either. ”

“ Even on some good networks people can wreak havoc on each other’s files by overcrowding disks with information. There can even be network saboteurs.
“You can’t network unless people act as a team and care about their colleagues’ records. If a company’s isn’t like that, it might be better off with a strong data-processing department to police everyone. Or they might just use micros not connected to each other—so that people will crash only their own disks.
“They might network only after they’ve successfully run employees through a training program to promote good work habits.” ”

“ Human Factors in Computer and Information Systems, said:
“Select has very few commands. There are very different people in the world. You’re very attracted to choice and options, and you seek the power that WordStar offers. But very simply, people are different. Some like to drive Maseratis, and some like to go twenty miles per hour.”
He was right. There might even be a version of Select better than today’s WordStar; software is constantly changing, and when you shop, you must do your homework to make sure you’re buying the best program available for your needs at the time. ”

“ But if computer users not only chose their machines and software well but used them well, if they formed users groups rather than trust peripatetic sales reps, if they avoided technobullies and hired consultants carefully, if they trained employees in a nonintimidating way, if they computerized humanely as well as efficiently, if they safeguarded their data security, if they prepared for the future through telecommuting when appropriate, if they showed persistence and sense, enough rewards were there, and they’d find the Silicon Jungle to be not only survivable but friendly. ”

“ Select Information Systems, moreover, a forty-employee company in Kentfield, California, was running an advertising campaign as slick as any distiller’s.
“No contest,” proclaimed a San Francisco Examiner columnist in one ad in 1982, looking up from his Xerox 820, dangling a pair of glasses from his hand, like some refugee from a Famous Writers School. “Select was easier to learn.” The ads didn’t say what he was comparing it to, but a popular computer magazine named his equivalent of Brand X, WordStar. ”

“ Or U.S. firms using computer-satellite hookups to pipe in the work of $3-an-hour clerks? The People’s Republic of China was even preparing to sell programming skills to the rest of the world. A billion 13programmers, maybe? So much for high tech as a refuge for the American jobless.
How could you make computerization a joy to all? That was one answer you’d never find in a computer store.
You could, however, set up the right retraining program for valued employees to see them through automation. You could fight the Hal Syndrome. You could work to end boring tasks. ”

“ A store can only sell you a computer, not common sense. Nor can this chapter impart it to you. It can, however, pound away at the elements of data security—people, policies, hardware, and software. They go together, these four. And so do the criminal and noncriminal parts of data security. If you’ve lost control of your computer files and don’t know what’s normal, you’ll hardly notice the abnormal. You’ll never thwart a computerized embezzler, for instance, with a gun. You will with good software. ”

“ One of the main tricks of the crooked computer hustlers is nothing more than the retail-store version of leaving town ahead of the sheriff.
“The average computer salesman has a half-life of two months,” said my friend the systems analyst. “Then he loses his credibility with his supposed ‘clients’ and goes back to selling shoes or automobiles. If you’re relying on any salesman for expert knowledge, you might be in for a rude awakening. That’s why users groups formed. People got ticked off with this world of hucksterism and created their own little world.” ”

“ He isn’t an artist. But he uses a Macintosh computer.
With the Mac’s famous “mouse”—the pointer device that Joe rolls along his desk to move the cursor—he can effortlessly make sketches.
Granted, Joe isn’t detached about Mac’s virtues, not as a $50,000-a-year software products manager with Apple Computer! And this particular example is trivial. It’s also, however, irresistible. And the story indeed shows how graphics can ease the life of a corporate manager. People also use computer-drawn maps for, say, directing colleagues to meetings in new places. ”

“ What about the general issue of trust among people communicating by computer? Can people make policy, sign contracts, settle multimillion questions without shaking hands? You can have two people with computers in different locations calling up the same statistics from the same memory bank. ”

“ The screen is more viewable than many Apple monitors, and I’m a confirmed WordStar addict. Even if voice commands become the norm, I may well be among the last of the keyboard diehards. And yet, were I telecommuting, it wouldn’t matter. A corporate computer would care about the right series and speeds of bytes, not how they originated. So I might be able to keep using my electronic equivalent of a buggy whip.
Just about anybody, moreover, will be able to afford a useful small computer before the end of the century—because sooner or later one will be cheaper than today’s typical TV sets. ”

“ What’s more, the culprit needn’t be just the fluorescents that light so many American offices.
“The window with sunshine streaming in may still be a psychologically gratifying link with the outside world,” says Eisen, “but it spells plain eyestrain and perhaps headache for every VDT operator within range of the glare.” Even brightly painted walls can sin here.
So can glossy paper. In fact, any paper is bad in one over-powering way. The proper lighting level for paperwork is much higher than for computer work. And yet most computer operators have yet to see the much-touted paperless office. ”

“ An executive using a terminal half an hour a week obviously has needs different from a clerk doing tedious data-entry work most of the day. Even the executive, however, should have a screen big enough for unexpectedly long sessions in front of the tube. On the other hand, suppose a bank teller must view just a few columns of numbers every now and then; he may never need a screen bigger than a few inches. Too large a screen, in fact, even in heavy-duty work, may expose one to glary reflections. ”

“ A small businessman may enjoy more personal attention from a small consultant. He knows the people he’s dealing with, and it’s harder for the firm to pass the work on to a green employee—while charging the full price. The smallness of the firm, of course, makes it that much more important to check out references. Of course, sometimes the small guy may fit the large company’s bill; Michael Canyes, for instance, has tutored WordStar classes for the Federal Trade Commission—a good buy for the taxpayers, considering his skill and low overhead. ”

“ Programs are like people. “Mature” software is more reliable. It’s more like a tried-and-tested salesman or secretary, less risky, say, than a green employee hired off the street.
A complex creation like WordStar, with its thousands of lines of instructions for your computer, won’t ever be 100-percent glitchless. But it’s close. MicroPro, the company selling it, normally tests its programs well before unleashing them on the market, and WordStar has been around since the late 1970s, giving others the pleasure of suffering bugs before you have a chance. ”

“ You’re not dim-witted if WordStar doesn’t come as easily to you as to me. Oddly, I found Select—ballyhooed as a beginner’s word processor—to be more of a puzzle. Oh, well. One person’s dream software may be another’s kludge.
Keep in mind, however, that you must often suffer trade-offs between easiness, speed, power, and versatility. Although WordStar might not give you instant gratification, its speed and power may justify the struggle. Ditto for some of the best spreadsheets and other software categories. The big question is, How much word processing or spreadsheeting, or whatever, do you do? ”

“ Writing software for micros is like writing short stories instead of novels. You’ve got to be more elegant and get to the point faster. A micro’s memory simply lacks the capacity of a mainframe and brooks less sloppiness than would a larger machine. Many great novelists could never write decent short stories, and many first-class mainframers just couldn’t code cleverly or deviously enough for micros—couldn’t electronically trick them into thinking they were larger machines. ”

“ Don’t be a corporate chauvinist. Every company has its share of gobblers.
Turning to an outside consultant? Then, through computer stores, you might try to track down a local users group for a brand of hardware or software. Go to a meeting. Find out whom the members regard as an ace consultant. In fact, try to go to several user groups—remember the preference that Apple owners, say, may have in favor of an Apple solution or that Kaypro owners may have in favor of a Kaypro one. Mere word of mouth, though, is still no substitute for a thorough interview with the consultant and reference checks. ”

“ High tech is enough of a gamble for the more solid computer makers. Shakier ones can be reckless, and often at customers’ expense. A newspaper perceptively observed, “Computers are hyped before they’re ready, announced before they’re shipped and sometimes outdated and outpriced before they reach retailers’ shelves.”
I’ll try to help you find the machine that’s best for you—not necessarily the one that computer hustlers envision on your desk. ”

“ Near the ARC-5 I saw a giant condenser for a transmitter. With row after row of plates on a metal shaft, it looked like an electronic potato slicer. I thought of fingernail-sized chips in computers today; the big potato slicer might as well be an artifact from another species. There in the crawl space the 1950s showed up in little vacuum tubes the size of pill bottles. They were a reminder of the short-sightedness of the U.S. electronics executives who had stayed years too long with vacuum-tube technology. Just what did this mean to American computer makers facing similar challenges? ”

“ Even an IBM salesman couldn’t puzzle out all the ways to adjust the ergonomic furniture on which a Displaywriter sat. Despite such a flaw, however, special computer furniture isn’t just a frill. An ergonomic desk and chair might cost several hundred dollars more than an ordinary set—even a lesser-known brand may—but your furniture could be good for a decade. And just a 5 percent increase in a cleric’s productivity may pay back the extra investment in less than two years. ”

“ Another beauty of good user groups is that they work closely with dealers and manufacturers without compromising their own independence.
With fellow owners just a quick phone call away, you’ll be less at the mercy of know-nothing hucksters.
Obviously, too, before buying the machine, you’ll find that the user groups can be just the ticket for learning the quirks of the dealers and the machines. Ask discreet questions after the meetings. Which machines and dealers are winners? Which are gobblers? ”

“ TRAVAIL. Computerization is harder than your friendly computer store might lead you to believe, but most likely you’ll justify your travail.
Someone once said he never knew of an author who gave up his computer and returned to a pen. I’ll buy that.
THROUGH IT ALL,
KNOW WHAT THE OTHER GUY’S UP TO. You’re better off if you know what the other guy—or woman—is up to.
This book is, frankly, for top executives and mid-level people, small businessmen, and professionals. And if your employees read it? Well, so much the better. ”

“ Could piecework be just a gimmick to help impersonally squeeze the last drop of blood from the clerical telecommuters? Is telecommuting a mean-spirited or enlightened response to the day-care problem? I suspect some companies are mean spirited. Not all. But some. Ideally, however, this won’t deprive society of telecommuting’s benefits. Munytels, after all, could help solve the child-care problem, and changes in the labor laws could guarantee the fairness of the piecework system for all. Existing ones do cover clerks doing piecework. ”