
We all use computers and computer-based devices. Some of us use them effectively, but more of us use them just effectively enough that we're unaware of how truly powerful they can be. Computer-based devices have three levels of capabilities.
- Ready-to-use capabilities
- All our devices have capabilities intended for use with almost no training. Menu and ribbon commands, keyboard shortcuts, and email message filtering are examples. But some capabilities are hard to find, and some, once found, are hard to understand and remember. The ease-of-use of these machines is often oversold.
- If you want to benefit from these capabilities, invest effort in learning about them. Because that investment pays for itself quickly, learning one new thing generates time to learn the next. Try this: Windows Mac
- Organizational If everyone is so busy doing "real work"
that they have no time to learn how to
do it better, they'll just use what
they already knowleaders who expect employees to learn how to use these capabilities on their own are perhaps a bit naïve. Employees need support, assistance, and time to explore. If everyone is so busy doing "real work" that they have no time to learn how to do it better, they'll just use what they already know. The lost productivity rapidly accumulates to levels beyond the savings that came from not offering training and support. - Simple extensions
- Many software applications support stationery, templates, styles, bookmarks, hyperlinks, macro recording, and so on. Mastering these simple extensions takes some effort — more than simple menu commands and keyboard shortcuts.
- Although these extensions seem easy enough in blog posts and YouTube videos, for many, the simplicity is deceptive. The shortest path to mastery usually involves getting help from peers or user groups. Seek help and pay it forward.
- Organizations can make some templates, stationery, or styles available to everyone. Tragically, organizations rarely support effective education in using these assets, but they could. Making it easier for employees to learn does reduce costs.
- Programmatic extensions
- Because this third class of capabilities usually involves programming — scripts are an example — most employees cannot exploit them. Even when they know what tools they want and what tools could simplify their work, they don't know how to produce them. Some do, of course, and they do benefit.
- Unless you have a talent for programming and user interface design, leave these items to experts. People who try to exploit these capabilities, and who lack necessary skills, often find that the effort does not pay.
- This class of automation tools is the domain of the expert. The organization must step forward, making resources available to the people who know what tools they need, but lack the ability to build them. Supporting those resources is cheaper than letting people waste their time trying to do what they cannot.
Whether you have broad organizational responsibility, or you're just trying to get through the day without falling further behind, there's much you can do to get more done with less effort. Exploit automation. Top
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Related articles
More articles on Personal, Team, and Organizational Effectiveness:
When Meetings Boil Over
- At any time, without warning, you can find yourself in a meeting that boils over. Sometimes tempers
rise, then voices rise, and then people yell and scream. What can a team do when meetings threaten to
boil over — and when they do?
Become a Tugboat Captain
- If your job responsibilities sometimes require that you tell powerful people that they must do something
differently, you could find yourself in danger from time to time. You can learn a lot from tugboat captains.
Troublesome Terminology
- The terms we use at work to talk about practices, policies, and procedures are serviceable, for the
most part. But some of them carry connotations and hidden messages that undermine our larger purposes.
The Good, the Bad, and the Complicated
- In fiction and movies, the world is often simple. There's a protagonist, a goal, and a series of obstacles.
The protagonists and goals are good, and the obstacles are bad. Real life is more complicated.
Disjoint Awareness: Systematics
- Organizations use some policies and processes that can cause people in collaborations to have inaccurate
understandings of what each other is doing. Performance management, politics, and resource allocation
processes can all contribute to disjoint awareness.
See also Personal, Team, and Organizational Effectiveness and Problem Solving and Creativity for more related articles.
Forthcoming issues of Point Lookout
Coming June 7: Toxic Disrupters: Tactics
- Some people tend to disrupt meetings. Their motives vary, but they use techniques drawn from a limited collection. Examples: they violate norms, demand attention, mess with the agenda, and sow distrust. Response begins with recognizing their tactics. Available here and by RSS on June 7.
And on June 14: Pseudo-Collaborations
- Most workplace collaborations produce results of value. But some collaborations — pseudo-collaborations — are inherently incapable of producing value, due to performance management systems, or lack of authority, or lack of access to information. Available here and by RSS on June 14.
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