Tom Hula wrote:

>I was getting a tour of a prospective employer's computer room once and I
>saw a
>report printing out on a printer.  The person who was showing me around
>confessed that the report was actually hand-typed in a word-processor and
>then
>printed because someone (parent company perhaps?) demanded that the report be
>"computer-generated."  It looked like it was and I suppose that's all that
>counts.

I had the opposite experience when I was DP manager for a manufacturing
firm a long time ago. Six or seven months after the end of what had been
a long and difficult MRP implementation (mostly because senior
engineering management's old habits like taking stuff from the stockroom
without recording it had to be broken), I was wandering around the
building looking for computer problems. I came across a material control
person copying information from a computer-generated report onto a big
green columnar pad. Thinking that perhaps the report didn't meet her
needs, I asked her if she needed different information on the report, or
a different sort order.

"No," she said. "This report has everything I need. But our weekly
manufacturing meeting is this afternoon, and Mike [the VP of
manufacturing] doesn't trust the computer. I just handwrite it for him."

-- Bruce


--------------------------------------------------------------------------
Bruce Toback    Tel: (602) 996-8601| My candle burns at both ends;
OPT, Inc.            (800) 858-4507| It will not last the night;
11801 N. Tatum Blvd. Ste. 142      | But ah, my foes, and oh, my friends -
Phoenix AZ 85028                   | It gives a lovely light.
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