A continuation of some empirical generalisations that influence or limit macrocognitive system performance from Hoffman and Woods.
1. Kluge generalisation: Work systems create pressures on workers to adapt via use of workarounds and kluges (improvising or fitting together an ill-assorted collection of parts or functions). There’s virtually always some gap between the original design objective or work as planned/prescribed/disclosed versus reality.
2. The stretched systems generalisation: macrocognitive systems increasingly require higher work tempos and more efficient levels of performance, thereby exploiting new capabilities for more complex forms of work. Moreover, in some cases, additional layers of risk control or slack resources (staffing, technology, equipment, finances etc.) are reinvested into enhancing tempo and efficiency, again pushing performance to the acceptable limits.
3. Fluency generalisation: Here “Well-adapted cognitive work occurs with a facility that belies the difficulty of resolving demands and balancing dilemmas”. That is, prescribed work appears fluid and efficient (“it must be a great written system process”), but that masks the dynamic nature of adaptations required by people to fill in gaps, uncertain procedures or inadequate/missing resources etc.
Refs:
1. Hoffman, R. R., & Woods, D. D. (2011). Beyond Simon’s slice: five fundamental trade-offs that bound the performance of macrocognitive work systems. IEEE Intelligent Systems, 26(6), 67-71.
2. Hoffman, R. R., & Woods, D. D. (2011). Simon’s slice: Five fundamental tradeoffs that bound the performance of human work systems. In 10th International Conference on Naturalistic Decision Making, Orlando FL (pp. 5-31).
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