Case 2 - Reverse Automation: Unnecessary Forms and Procedures
This is part of an ongoing series about Los Angeles County gov't waste.
Updated 9/23/2024.
Often there are convoluted & wasteful forms, processes, and/or procedures that continue over the years because nobody bothers to simplify them.
If somebody higher up is not complaining about something, it's usually left as-is, as change is Rocking The Boat, the Greatest County Sin. They often say, "It cost too much money to simplify". But the convoluted approach is often costing more money in the longer run by making employees take unnecessary time to do it the convoluted way: Penny-Wise-Pound-Foolish.
It's similar to a consumer deciding whether to rent or buy a house. A house requires more up-front expenditure but is usually less expensive in the longer run. The County "rents" too often. They rarely do a true cost-benefit analysis to see if waste claims are really true. They either guess out of their ass or don't guess at all out of laziness and/or fear-of-rocking-the-boat. If it ain’t broke, nobody fixes it, even if it’s “leaking” time and money. Glub glub glub...
One place had employees key in their own time-sheets into a computerized form, but they also had to fill them out manually on a paper-based system, roughly comparable to filling out a spreadsheet printout, and having the printout signed by themselves and their supervisor. (This includes both regular time, and vacation requests.)
And the second system was a very different style of form, ruling out simple copying. Thus, it’s a three-layered-shit-burger: two different formats, and requires paper signatures. And it was that way for roughly a decade, and may even still be going on. I can’t comment further on the status at this time.
How is that "automation" if it's twice as much work than a paper-only solution? It's reverse-automation; even the Flintstones would laugh at it. Often the paper sheets got lost in the shuffle and a big scramble ensued to either find it, or reprint and re-sign it before deadlines: a paper-chase.
The way improvements and modernization are typically decided upon is that the budgeting process allows a given amount to fix something to a given group based on office politics, not solid math. It doesn't matter what skipping or skimping on fixes costs other groups or employees in time, it's pretty much a fixed amount for one group. As a future post will show, allocation of funds coordinated across groups is more efficient and less money in the end.
A true cost-benefit analysis of an improvement, such as fixing the triple-assed time-sheet system mentioned, would involve computing the cost of not fixing it and comparing it to the cost of fixing.
For a hypothetical example, let’s say the average employee wastes a half an hour a week doing it as described above (half hour beyond a sane time system). Let’s say that’s 15 minutes for a regular employee and 2 days more per week for a typical time-sheet processing staffer; averaging 30 minutes per employee (averaging all types of employees together).
30 minutes = 0.5 hours x $35 per hr. x 2 [OH] = $35 per employee per week.
(OH is overhead, which is roughly twice an employee’s salary, and includes hiring, offices, HR services, etc. [1] And $35 is a rough average County salary.)
$35 x 52 weeks = $1820 per employee per year.
x 10000 employees = $18.2 million a year. (Typical Dept. size assumed)
Let's say fixing the time-sheet system so that it only has to be done online costs a one-time expenditure of $60 million [2].
Over 10 years, the cost of NOT reworking the time system is approximately $182 million:
Thus, after 10 years we have wasted $122 million in our hypothetical model (182 - 60, 60 being the overhaul price).
The current people in charge may look at that (60 mil) and think to themselves, "That would take too much out of the current year's budget! I would no longer have money for the fancy showy ideas I promised! Skippit! (A future article will cover ego-driven decision making.)
Is this rational? By most “managerial accounting principles”, NO! Although it varies per organization, the county keeps systems on average about 10 years, so we’ll use that as our reference period. That may even be conservative, as we’ll see in a future topic. (For some offices, management turnover is roughly 4 years, so they have no incentive to recognize 10 years out, so kick the can down the road to somebody else.)
Cost-benefit analyses (CBA) like this should be done on ALL non-trivial systems, or at least those reported as requiring the most time and frustration to use [3]. The cost-benefit analysis should be available to the public upon request. Without external scrutiny, riff-raff managers tilt things in their own personal favor instead of general efficiency. (Personal info should be redacted on the CBA for the general public, but registered reporters could be given more details.)
And the time-sheet system is not the only boondoggle [4], I’ll visit more later.
Footnotes
[1] Doubling salary as an approximation of overhead costs is a common practice in cost and efficiency analysis. A more thorough study of a given organization would produce a more accurate value.
[2] Most systems have an up-front cost and then a maintenance charge every year, so the $60 mil is a simplification. A more realistic value may be $40 mil up front and then $2 mil each year, costing $20 mil after 10 years. But we are simplifying to keep the example simple. Also, it may take longer than 1 year to implement any new system, but this kind of system would probably last longer than 10 years, roughly offsetting the delay in implementation.
[4] I should point out that someone claimed that by some "big rule" employees are required to sign physical paper. For one, that’s outmoded thinking as e-signing is quite common. Paper should only be used for a backup when the system is down. Also, it’s possible to have the time-sheet system print a copy of an employee’s time, as filled out on line, and all the employee has to do is sign the bottom. So even if the “paper rule” is true, a good computer system can still reduce form time. I truly doubt there’s a legitimate excuse for the convoluted approach.
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