tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-71368008264854281122024-03-13T13:18:23.376-04:00Enterprise RulesKnowledge-Based Systems at work in the enterprise.
<br>A <a href="http://bit.ly/2lyh9a"> Knowlengr</a> siteknowlengrhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01857586646777639084noreply@blogger.comBlogger7125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7136800826485428112.post-37177400115443222532013-12-30T21:47:00.000-05:002013-12-30T21:47:19.563-05:00Rule: Unified Communications for Regulated Mobile Phone B2C, B2B<div style="text-align: justify;">
You're celebrating because the firm finally embraced the holy grail of Unified Communication. Finally the telephone handset -- that perfect symbol of the pre-digital age -- can become a manageable part of the infrastructure. Outlook-to-phone, Gmail-to-Hangout or prop CTI solution? All good. Especially the links to customer and supplier contact records.</div>
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Does the schema identify which of those contact phone numbers are mobile? Turns out, that could be quite useful. The FTC's <a href="http://fcc.us/JqxK5M" target="_blank">Telephone Consumer Protection Act</a> (TCPA) went into effect in 1991, but rule changes could affect many commercial enterprises who reach out to customers or prospects. As the Marketing Research Association noted in <a href="http://bit.ly/1fXb0Fa" target="_blank">their opinion piece on the subject</a>:</div>
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Nearly two-fifths of American homes (38.2%) had cell phones and no landline phones in the 2nd half of 2012 – almost double since 2008. About 36.5% of all adults (86 million) lived in wireless only homes -- and the same for 45% of all children (33 million children). In addition, a sixth of American homes (15.9%) still had a landline, but received all or almost all calls on their cell phones.</blockquote>
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The October 2013 TCPA regulation update could mandate that firms conduct phone transactions with cell phone owners differently from others. One of the clearer set of <a href="http://bit.ly/1fXb0Fa" target="_blank">guidelines is provided by IBM SPSS</a>. Their list concludes with this sample solution:</div>
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Federal regulations prohibit the use of autodialers for dialing cellular phone numbers. In order to comply with the regulations, an additional column (<b>IsCellPhone</b> for example) can be added to the Sample Table. The new column contains the values True/False, to denote which sample records are cellular phone numbers. The Sample Management Script will then need to be modified such that if IsCellPhone = True, then the number should be manually dialed, rather than autodialed by the system.</blockquote>
Got it. Time to tweak scripts and add a few more audit rows in case the FTC or a class action lawyer comes calling.<br />
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<b>Conclusion: </b>Commercial organizations may be required to use manual methods to contact cell phone numbers and to demonstrate that they have policies in place to achieve this. A rule-based solution will require mobile bits associated with each phone number.</div>
knowlengrhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01857586646777639084noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7136800826485428112.post-51073402117239811102013-07-08T19:12:00.000-04:002013-07-08T21:17:41.513-04:00Escalation Workflow Automation and the Prescott Fire Tragedy<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh-BEar97Nh48KrPtm3ztL5AYK8WWOLnFBqHGn5kR9Ri0w4tMKfITem4ZPElA74uELkQYxTrXIOOqo-st8ZNFF-meWUiW6pO-fsPoOrSChM5T18mKFm5usOirUhWe5F77Yguk0YKjq_v8jb/s1600/national-interagency-fire-center.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="116" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh-BEar97Nh48KrPtm3ztL5AYK8WWOLnFBqHGn5kR9Ri0w4tMKfITem4ZPElA74uELkQYxTrXIOOqo-st8ZNFF-meWUiW6pO-fsPoOrSChM5T18mKFm5usOirUhWe5F77Yguk0YKjq_v8jb/s400/national-interagency-fire-center.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Web Site of National Interagency Fire Center</td></tr>
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In the <a href="http://nyti.ms/1bjmd1z" target="_blank">NYT account of the lethal fire</a> that overcame 19 experienced firefighters near the Arizona town of Prescott, mention was made of problems some dispatchers encountered with support systems. It would seem that the Doce Fire may not have been caused by issues in the region's dispatch and call center, but perhaps those contributing factors couldn't be ruled out, either. The NYT reporters wrote,<br />
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As the Hotshots carried their chain saws to Doce’s western edge, dispatchers faced serious technical challenges. Telephone calls were being disconnected or were not going through. A computerized system that helps the dispatchers track crews was “giving all kinds of error messages,” a frustrated dispatcher said in a report logged on June 18 by the National Interagency Fire Center, a multiagency logistical support center. </div>
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“The problem is never taken seriously and never completely resolved for the long term,” the dispatcher wrote. “This has been an ongoing problem and happens EVERY time we have an incident. It is unacceptable! We need to remain at a high operational level 365 days out of the year."</div>
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The NYT story carried a <a href="http://1.usa.gov/1dbRB02" target="_blank">link to the web site of the National Interagency Fire Cente</a>r (which seemed to be down part of the time when this blog post was being authored) where these remarks can be seen. (Such organizational transparency is laudable.) What seems to be clear from these reports is that -- whether for reasons of personnel shortage, communications with vendor(s), inter-vendor coordination or other causes -- repeated periods of substandard service levels occurred and were not adequately addressed. For time-critical business processes such as these ( the NYC 911 call center is another example), automatic escalation and remediation is needed. Such escalation should be automatic, built into the workflow software / hardware of the associated systems.<br />
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Obvious triggers: dropped calls, connect latency, call duration, repeated calls to the same recipient -- and that's without knowing anything about the particulars of the dispatching software.</div>
knowlengrhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01857586646777639084noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7136800826485428112.post-33739070815282437202009-09-25T00:03:00.007-04:002009-09-25T00:11:49.248-04:00Capacity-based Triggers As De Facto Enterprise Rules<div style="text-align: justify;"><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgYumA-F4l5EQiLG4T2FsHyMevraQ1_Sa5jkaFmHKR-z-oQKXVXOP3ivNBB0pTN8j13FPt0eZpOkQhwL_Wz5v1S8P-th7TK6__XFqeWKUbQerx9QuWuSqOp8-hAdpgvb8kdM4TsE4SE_Mgc/s1600-h/carbonite-logo.png"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 183px; height: 46px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgYumA-F4l5EQiLG4T2FsHyMevraQ1_Sa5jkaFmHKR-z-oQKXVXOP3ivNBB0pTN8j13FPt0eZpOkQhwL_Wz5v1S8P-th7TK6__XFqeWKUbQerx9QuWuSqOp8-hAdpgvb8kdM4TsE4SE_Mgc/s320/carbonite-logo.png" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5385249434928062162" border="0" /></a>Here's a de facto enterprise rule. It may be an enterprise's intentional rule, but more often than not, it's a de facto one.</div><p></p><blockquote><span style="font-weight: bold;">RULES</span> <span style="font-style: italic;">Customer-perceived rule:</span> If you can't reach the sales office (Carbonite) you can't purchase the service.<br /><span style="font-style: italic;">Enterprise rule</span>: If inbound sales exceeds <span style="font-style: italic;">n</span> calls / hour, push all calls to voice mail.<br /></blockquote><p></p><p style="text-align: justify;">From an enterprise's perspective -- the seller in this instance -- the sales office's inaccessibility may be unintentionally salutary. It limits customer volume at a time when the enterprise's infrastructure and staff may be unable to handle the volume. Of course, sales are lost, and customers must question why the sales staff is unavailable during peak daytime periods, but the enterprise rule could serve its purpose, at least as a stopgap measure during an unusual circumstance.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">Later facts that came to light about <a href="http://bit.ly/rI2Ns">Carbonite</a> (a hosted provider of backup services) suggest that this rule may not be de facto in their case, but nevertheless a capacity-based trigger such as inbound phone sales inquiry volume remains an illustrative use case.<br /></p><p></p>knowlengrhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01857586646777639084noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7136800826485428112.post-82719908498595247002009-06-23T19:30:00.000-04:002013-05-24T15:04:49.673-04:00Risky Editorial Workflow Can Sabotage Product Evaluations<div align="justify">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhVLIRNWEms5X99BuRF3HK85lthN5AGl1l9DJSxhhJhIooDfiH6MzvmTio9Poauqk7PwTd5vFktlwIYlOztCBrnYPemMAvDVxyz-88Fm-OSYEx6kVuD-8yzapPdkfM0CuhqPNcwA4znnkFM/s1600-h/origins-logo.jpg" onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5350275114679339922" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhVLIRNWEms5X99BuRF3HK85lthN5AGl1l9DJSxhhJhIooDfiH6MzvmTio9Poauqk7PwTd5vFktlwIYlOztCBrnYPemMAvDVxyz-88Fm-OSYEx6kVuD-8yzapPdkfM0CuhqPNcwA4znnkFM/s320/origins-logo.jpg" style="cursor: pointer; float: right; height: 84px; margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; width: 218px;" /></a>Recently a colleague attempted to post a product evaluation for Origins, an Estee Lauder brand. An initial product review submission was rejected because it mentioned a non-Estee product. After excising the offending language, the review was resubmitted. It was rejected again. My dogged colleague was determined to post a review, and requested an explanation. This time the Company said it had made a mistake, and permitted the post (after an "up to 72 hours" delay).</div>
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Workflow for editorial review of product evaluations and customer-submitted commentary may prove increasingly important, as such postings may prove long-lived, and potentially quoted and spidered far beyond the original post. Eloquent or prolific posters can be influential, with opinions that spread virally beyond the original scope. Enterprises must develop efficient but sound editorial practices to respond to product evaluations sensibly, with both transparency and consistency.</div>
knowlengrhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01857586646777639084noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7136800826485428112.post-6896101856498647612009-05-23T11:03:00.000-04:002009-05-23T11:45:48.139-04:00Enterprise Rules in the Heat of the Moment<div align="justify"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhxgVSFoVPUWZm03RymQdcNWE8Xg6PZGM_HPnmjAQNhtRnbYENlxTRfk4-PxSHGz4Kop-laL_D7a2BrbOVWpdHg6u0V2NCvYzVA1XTbvnlh71h1bPD8zib6SCGTqQCgZhQZxnRQWqik9mDY/s1600-h/verizon-call-center-story-20090523.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px 0px 10px 10px; width: 186px; float: right; height: 128px;" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5339037489914388114" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhxgVSFoVPUWZm03RymQdcNWE8Xg6PZGM_HPnmjAQNhtRnbYENlxTRfk4-PxSHGz4Kop-laL_D7a2BrbOVWpdHg6u0V2NCvYzVA1XTbvnlh71h1bPD8zib6SCGTqQCgZhQZxnRQWqik9mDY/s200/verizon-call-center-story-20090523.jpg" border="0" /></a> The Times-Reporter relays a story about a Verizon call center <a href="http://bit.ly/ydsoI">refusal to help the Ohio State Highway Patrol find a man in obvious distress</a> by using the man's cell phone signal. According to the report, the reason given by Verizon was a $20 balance due on the phone.<br /></div><br /><div align="justify">The story is making its way around Twitter and will reverbate in ways the Verizon workflow architect may never imagined. Those working in public /private utilities have a responsibility to plan for extraordinary and infrequent situations. When I worked in a call center for a large heating oil firm in the Northeast, this usually meant instructing agents in how to recognize such situations and, sometimes, to escalate the call.</div><div align="justify"><br />The general rule, "Provide no service if there are unpaid bills" may be tempered by subrules that assess the longevity of the account, the amount due, or the reason for the assistance call -- and that's just a few of the possible exceptions. There may be privacy or legal issues, which the reporter in the Verizon Ohio case does not mention. Withholding heating oil deliveries in Massachusetts in February can be a matter of life or death for the infirm or elderly. This was a technique used by some delinquent customers to obtain deliveries -- which is why the workflow rules must be decided in advance, not on the spot in the heat [sic] of the moment.</div><div align="justify"><br />Another consideration is agent training and software access to <a href="http://www.enterpriserules.com/">enterprise rules</a>. A lightly trained agent on a busy day might feel it easier to follow the rule without exploring exceptions than a well-trained and well-rested agent. That said, a call from the Ohio HP should have been exceptional enough trigger another look at the Verizon rule book. Asking the HP to pay the bill in order to locate a man after an 11-hour search seems, on the surface, to merit the ridicule the Verizon is likely to receive from the re-tweets and <a href="http://news.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=09/05/22/225259">a Slashdot post</a>.</div>knowlengrhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01857586646777639084noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7136800826485428112.post-60600168200531931002009-05-17T16:26:00.000-04:002009-05-17T16:46:06.031-04:00Big Loan Servicers Lack Rules Agility<div align="justify"><img style="MARGIN: 0px 0px 10px 10px; WIDTH: 171px; FLOAT: right; HEIGHT: 157px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5336893678418802306" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjhAN2PpWSFoN-EDC251qyoh84SAQQxpZbJwEcjjprlHpQFcYY4awbFcbjEhAYCEZhyphenhyphenLoAKcW1alp6X_CHWSPnqy8NJfjyzREV_jmrp1qut8mB8M_5mxLwkghJoKrgG7kygi3coZIa931_f/s320/chris-arnold-npr.jpg" />As shown convincingly on an <a href="http://bit.ly/f23G0">NPR report by Chris Arnold</a>, smaller loan servicers may be more capable of developing foreclosure avoidance strategies than the loan servicing organizations owned by the big banks. Conventional wisdom has it that bigger organizations achieve economies of scale that increase value to shareholders. In a crisis such as the current mortgage crisis in the U.S., there's cause to question that wisdom. The banks themselves are usually the big losers when properties are foreclosed. When workout loans can be developed to salvage some part of the loan, sometimes simply by reducing the interest rate, banks avoid huge losses when the property is liquidated. There are complications, such as accounting rules and other issues that complicate the matter, but the NPR story shows that . A casual web search for loan servicing software shows products such as <a href="http://www.loanledger.com/schedulr.html">LoanLedger</a>, which purport to support this type of analysis. The issue may be training, not technology, but on the surface, it appears that big servicers lack the agility to adapt to new market conditions, even when the economic incentive is compelling. In the NPR story, the smaller firm interviewed relayed a 2007 conversation with a large bank-run servicer in which the latter admitted they would be unable to prepare for the changes that would come about should the market suffer a severe downturn of the sort that was becoming clear at the time of the meeting.</div>knowlengrhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01857586646777639084noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7136800826485428112.post-32987607458243271602009-02-22T22:21:00.000-05:002013-05-24T15:27:52.482-04:00Computer Aided Medical Diagnosis<br />
The story begins like this.<br />
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" 'O.K., I’m glad it’s not lupus,' the middle-aged man said with a sad, rueful smile. He turned to look at the medical student who brought him the news of yet one more disease that it turned out he didn’t have.' "<br />
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From <a href="http://nyti.ms/19aMIp5" target="_blank">NYT Magazine article</a>:<br />
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"It’s a truism in medicine that difficult diagnoses are most likely to be made by the most or least experienced doctors. The most senior have a wide set of experiences to draw on. Whatever the diagnosis, there is a good chance that they have seen it. The novice doesn’t count on experience for guidance. His head is still stuffed with all the possibilities he read about in school — the rare diseases just as common in his experience as the more usual ones. The fact that the doctors caring for this patient had no experience with this disease but were well aware of the potentially fatal consequences of treatment made a difficult diagnosis even more so. In this setting, making a diagnosis is not simply an act of reason; it is a leap of faith."<br />
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-Lisa Sandersknowlengrhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01857586646777639084noreply@blogger.com1