Rapid, Global Communication of Company Policies and Standards

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Rapid, Global Communication of Company Policies
and Standards Presentation 534b to the AIChE
Annual Meeting Philadelphia, Pennsylvania Novembe
r 19, 2008 Authors Jeremiah P. OBrien and
Richard Wiand, Process Data Control Corp,
Arlington, Texas
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• Introduction
• The challenge of "getting everyone on the same
  page" is a
• significant one
• distributed office locations
• language differences
• technology constraints.
• At the same time, studies show that
• successful companies adhere to a
• common vision and core set of values
• enterprise-wide.
• Companies are challenged to find new ways to
• galvanize the creativity and productivity of
  their
• workforce to pursue company goals that
• employees share and support.

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• Introduction
• Information management (IM) systems are becoming
  an
• integral part of this cultural landscape because
  they
• are a ubiquitous part of the
• shared experience of staff members.
• cross departmental boundaries and management
• hierarchies, enabling them to serve multiple
  purposes.
• This paper discusses an approach to developing IM
  systems
• whose mission is task management, in order to
  explore
• Promoting a common vision and understanding
• Using this common vision to improve efficiency in
  the
• initial development and ongoing maintenance of
  task
• management systems.

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Reasons for Dysfunctional or Sub-optimal
Information Systems Some IM systems fail because
of strategic or tactical deficiencies Others
are held back by disconnects between work
processes and procedures, and the system.
Because computers have transitioned decades
from being a helpful resource, to being an
indispensible member of many work teams, our
ability to interact effectively with them is
mission-critical.
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• Reasons for Dysfunctional or Sub-optimal
  Information Systems
• IM system developers can improve user
  acceptability by following two suggestions
• User Needs must be defined along with user
• requirements. User Requirements can be reduced
  to
• punch lists but User Needs are more complex,
  and
• are likely to defy simplification.
• Both User Needs and User
• Requirements must be integrated
• with IM processes in a fundamental
• and intuitive way.

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Reasons for Dysfunctional or Sub-optimal
Information Systems IM developers may understate
user needs for a common language.
Consequently, systems are predicated on
meeting functional requirements they do not
meet user needs to work with recognizable
processes and procedures. IM systems that are
not perceived to be intuitive probably wont
succeed, because users have too much exposure to
intuitive systems in their everyday use of the
web to be content with anything less.
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Reasons for Dysfunctional or Sub-optimal
Information Systems Sometimes, intuitive IM or
paper-based systems are replaced with much more
efficient, but less intuitive and difficult to
use systems. For example, in the past,
Equipment Id. Numbers could include
descriptive about the items to which they
applied. A storage tank, for example, may
have been identified as Tank-101 a cooling
tower as CT-002. These same types of Id.
Numbers in systems such as SAP may be 20 digits
long, or longer.
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Ops Activity Planning Approach An alternate
approach to organizing data for task management
systems is based on the concept of an
Operational Activity (Ops Activity). Ops
Activities are definitions of common work
processes across a broad cross-section of
business practices and programs. Ops Activities
are inclusive of many procedures and decisions
by workers, as opposed to being defined for use
within the boundaries of an immediate IM
system requirement.
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Example Ops Activities Development Process Ops
Activities are predicated on the common
language of users in the workplace and a
universal understanding of what the terms in
that language represent. The beginning point
is an analysis of all business processes that
occupy the time or attention of users not the
purpose of the activities, but the activities
themselves. Ops Activities Analysis attempts
to define the functional elements of work
process supply chains, and then define the most
appropriate and widely understood terminology
for data associated with those elements.
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Example Ops Activities Development Process Step
1 Define Work Elements for an Ops Activity
Analysis Table 1 contains a list of the unique
regulatory requirements that apply to designing,
installing, operating and maintaining a closed
vent system (CVS). It is a subset of federal
CVS requirements, which is itself only a subset
of all the rules and regulations that apply to a
CVS. Table 1 consists of two columns, one
showing the citation of the rule that contains
the requirement, and the other showing the
regulatory text of each rule. A listing such
as this is the first step in developing an Ops
Activity Analysis, except that unlike Table 1,
the scope of the tasks listed should be as broad
as possible. The idea is to capture all
requirements and explain what is known about the
responsibilities of company personnel to meet
those requirements.
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• Example Ops Activities Development Process
• Step 2 Identify Tasks and Assign them to Ops
  Activities
• Table 2 consists of an abbreviated version of the
  CVS
• requirements shown in Table 1, plus two new
  columns.
• They are
• Description of a task which will satisfy the
• requirement when performed as scheduled and
• Brief description of the Ops Activity that best
  describes the action(s) of all tasks that share
  the same Ops Activity.
• The level of detail in defining tasks and Ops
  Activities
• depends on the scope and complexity of the
  business.

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Example Ops Activities Development Process Step
3 Define Ops Activities Table 3 shows Ops
Activity assignments and also the parameters
used for task groups, e.g., Frequency. Ops
Activities are not detailed enough to explain all
steps needed to complete a work assignment.
Their purpose is to group tasks with common or
related objectives for more efficient management
and/or recordkeeping. The plant whose data was
used to develop Table 3 is required to perform
about 22,000 equipment-specific compliance
tasks, which represent 3,600 unique tasks. The
Ops Activity Analysis for this plant categorized
3,600 unique tasks into 46 Ops Activities.
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• Recordkeeping Protocols and Ops Activities
• Process industry personnel, especially operators,
  do not have enough hours in their work day to
  validate each and every compliance task. Hence,
  records confirming that tasks were performed must
  be summarized to reduce this burden.
• Ops Activities provide a default schema for
  summarizing tasks for recordkeeping. Specific Ops
  Activity attributes are
• Primary Task Description a long description of
  the kinds of
• actions that the task group comprises.
• Task Frequency how often records will be kept.
• Assigned Person role of the person who will
  update records.
• Task Group Level the level at which task
  groups will be
• created, i.e., equipment-level, process unit
  level, or site-wide.

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Use and Maintainability of Ops Activities Employe
es generally react favorably to empowerment, and
the bonds of trust that are formed with
management can lead to a more productive
corporate culture. Any approach that empower
staff to accept greater accountability
for their work are likely to have a positive
impact on the corporate culture. Ops Activities
can empower staff to efficiently maintain their
tasks and task lists, keep all-important
records, and manage change. The IM system must
enable Ops Activities to be revised, rearranged,
and re-defined, as needed.
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Ops Activity Planning Approach Ops Activities
represent a different way to define data
elements. A similar shift is suggested by
William McDonough in his book, Cradle to Cradle
Remaking the Way We Make Things. Mr.
McDonough described his design process as
starting from a principles perspective
instead of starting with goals or tactics,
or with conventional practices. He credits
this philosophy with leading his team to build
the largest living roof in the world (10.4
acres) atop the Ford Motor Company assembly plant
in Dearborn, Michigan. We started from the idea
of a healthy workplace, he explained, and from
that principle grew the question of how you would
have healthy water healthy soil and healthy
air.
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Ops Activity Planning Approach IM systems are
not typically conceived or designed with an
organizations principles in mind they are more
commonly proposed to solve specific data
management problems. However, until Mr.
McDonough explored sustainability in his design
practice, the same could be said of designing
buildings. Ops Activities are responsive to
the core principle of using intuitive and
flexible methods to organize work processes.
Though Ops Activities have been used only in
developing task management systems, the authors
believe that they may be used in other types of
IM systems as well.
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• Trends and Other Uses of Ops Activities
• Tasks and task groups have become more common in
  recent years as the use of task management
  systems has grown. Several reasons are behind
  this trend, including new government rules, plant
  safety concerns, and quality improvement
  initiatives.
• Other examples of corporate initiatives that
  involve task management systems include
• ISA/ANSI 84.00 Standards
• Operations Logs and Routine Duties
• Pharmaceuticals -- FDA Compliance
• Plant Maintenance
• Sarbanes-Oxley

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• Summary
• Task management systems in process plants will
  continue to
• expand they can help to achieve corporate goals
  such as
• increased accountability of staff and improved
  oversight of
• operations (plus, theres the CYA factor).
• Ops Activities provide a method for
• organizing tasks into intuitively
• identifiable blocks to support more rational
• (and standardized) methods of recordkeeping.
• Using Ops Activities to organize task management
  system
• data could benefit other areas, such as
• staff training (e.g., do Ops Activities correlate
  with curriculums?)
• performance reporting and analysis
• handling changes in recordkeeping policies
  procedures.