Why People and Tools are a Complementary Combination

Today’s guest post is by Ahmad Nadeem Syed, Director of Revenue Assurance and Fraud Management at Mobilink. When long-standing talkRA contributor David Leshem argued why people are more valuable than tools, he prompted a flurry of replies, both agreeing and disagreeing with David’s opinions. Ahmad was amongst the respondents, leaving a thoughtful comment that said neither is more valuable than the other, because value is generated when tools complement people. He finished his comment by asking that the next talkRA blog on the topic should discuss that theme of the complementary combination of people and tools – so I invited him to write it! Ahmad graciously agreed, and here is his article on why we should focus on the combination of people and tools, rather than dwelling on each element separately.

In the Stone Age, human needs were limited to eating and sleeping. Their food comprised of available wild animal meat, fruits and vegetables. They used stones or wooden arrows for hunting and long sticks for plucking fruit that was out of reach. We can see the apes doing the similar thing even today, while breaking a coconut.

The activity incorporates three things: (1) the goal – the instinct to survive; (2) the people – the Stone Age human; and (3) the tools – stones and wooden arrows. Imagine various situations; there are hungry people with available tools but not knowing (the skill) how to aim and throw the stone or arrow at the prey. In another situation: there are hungry people with skill, but no tools available with lot of food available. In both the situations the ultimate goal of survival is not met if the variables become constant.

With the passage of time, the goals kept moving and growing from survival to comfort to luxuries, both vertically and horizontally. This necessitated having more and better tools coupled with people having advanced skills who are able to use these tools for the purpose of achieving the desired goals.

Come to today’s modern age; if it can be called modern in the eyes of the generation coming after say 50 years, in the wake of rapidly changing human needs and the technology. Humans have always been more and more dependent upon technology with the passage of every moment, may it be personal, social or business life. The mobile phone, for example, has become an essential part of our lives. Some are using the latest smart phones, and some are still content with only voice and SMS. Both classes have developed the skills to use these tools to meet their varying needs. Can anybody today imagine toady’s life without mobile phones, and in reverse, lot of mobile phones but no people?

The computers are integral part of any business, but then we need people with varying skills to develop the applications and run the computers. Can anybody imagine any business today with lots of people but no computers or vice versa? Some may argue some small businesses still rely on pen and paper, but then these are also tools.

PNTdiagramI call this the PNT (People-Need-Tool) phenomena. People are meant to live, and so they have needs, and tools allow them to meet their needs. Once the first set of needs is met, another set of needs become a necessity and therefore another set of tools is required.

Let me mention a busted myth here. It was commonly said that automation will cause widespread unemployment as computers will replace the human. But the reality is different. As the business and social needs increased, the way of managing these sectors changed, generating and using high volumes of data. Handling of these data volumes require better, high performance and sometimes specially designed computers/tools. The operation of these tools needed skilled people, therefore the automation instead of creating unemployment, paved the way for IT education and thus generating new opportunities.

Let us take the examples of telecommunication. I work for a GSM operator, where network elements are producing over a billion CDRs on a daily basis. These CDRs are processed by mediation, IN and billing systems. As the head of the Revenue Assurance and Fraud Management team, where I have a highly skilled team of analysts and IT professionals, I use very high performance RA and FM systems to ensure that no revenue leakage occurs. I will be completely stuck, the day either my key people are absent, or any of my key systems goes offline.

I therefore believe in people and tools being a complementary combination, without any preference.

Guest
Guest
From time to time, Commsrisk invites special guests to make an expert contribution.

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2 COMMENTS

  1. I believe the main issue in RA is becoming too dependent on tools or thinking they are some kind of recipe to automagically perform all tasks… Tools aid and make people more efficient; people are imperative, the organization you work in and externalities, as well as what you want to accomplish at the end of the day all matters…

  2. I agree with Michael. A balance needs to be worked out. We can not leave the decision making on entirely on tools. This may lead to increased risk of “False Positive”.

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