Definition
Processing an institution requires people to do by hand. They integrate fragmented information, keep track of state across interactions, spot anomalies, reconcile conflicting rules, anticipate failures, handle exceptions, route problems, settle ambiguous cases and remember what the institution forgets.
It goes by other names: navigation, advocacy, professionalism, resilience, life admin. Functionally it is computation, assigned to the wrong subsystem. The redesign keeps the function and moves it to the layer with the capacity and authority to perform it. See Where difficulty lives.
DiagnosticStructural
Tests that show it is in place
- Each task a person performs to complete a process is named by the function it serves.
- For each, the record says whether the institution already holds the information or authority to perform it.
- Tasks the institution could perform are scheduled for transfer or justified in writing.
Evidence to keep
- Artifact: A task inventory for one process from the person's side.
- Behavior: A person re-supplying information the institution already holds.
- Metric: Steps per process performed by the person that the institution could perform.
References
- Where difficulty lives · Theory