Poka-yoke is Japanese for “mistake-proofing.” Think of the “In Case of Fire Break Glass” boxes found in office buildings. Because they include a wee stick with which to break said glass, they would qualify as poka-yoke.

Best of all, your employees will experience minimal downtime and very little lost productivity.

In business, Schrage explains, poka-yoke is the “simplest, cheapest, and surest way to eliminate foreseeable process errors.” He urges managers to perform a poka-yoke audit of their own department.

“What are the persistently simple — and simply persistent — dumb mistakes we make that our technologies can help us catch and destroy?” he asks.

Here’s where I believe IT managers should start: the help desk.

Say your company is planning an Office 2007 migration, and you, as CIO, have decided that because of the current economic climate, assistance isn’t needed. After all, your reliance on internal help desk staff during previous Office upgrades didn’t turn out disastrously.

You can take a number of approaches:

• Train your existing IT staffers on Office 2007, and hire extra workers to handle the migration, which would include extensive training and standard benefits;

• hire temps or rely on your current all-in-one outsourcer to get you through it;

• or, bring in a specialized migration partner.

As you may have heard, Office 2007 is radically different from earlier versions. Even the most experienced users will have trouble performing basic tasks like saving documents.

Which one do you think qualifies as the simplest, the cheapest and surest?

In principle, working with the staff you have and hiring a few more keeps the control in your hands, but doesn’t make sense financially or logistically. You will need to train new employees on the entire Office 2007 suite, pay benefits, and dole out extra expenses for an after-hours support skeleton crew.

Such a significant time and money investment (at about $85 per call) does not make sense when you consider that you have no guarantee the new FTEs and your existing IT staff will be able to cover a full-swing migration while maintaining their regular duties. Plus, your new employees will be generalists, supporting only a dozen or so applications. The average peak hold time for this solution is nine minutes, and the call abandonment rate is 10 percent.

At an average of $96 a call, temps are pricier than full-timers, and don’t even deliver better service (15 percent abandonment rate). A temp solution offers generalist support and an average 15-minute hold time during peak hours. It does not provide training, advanced Office 2007 support, or awareness campaigns.

Choosing a big-box outsourcer seems like a smart option if you already contract with one for other services. At $59 on average per call, this option is cheaper than hiring temps and full-timers. Also, some all-in-ones offer training in conjunction with a migration. The downside: The staff is mostly generalists whose first language is not English. Some big outsourcers employ tiered-model desks as well. When you factor in the 10-minute peak hold time and 15 percent call abandonment rate, this option loses its shine.

The last option, a migration partner, is often dismissed as an unnecessary expense, especially when budgets are sparse. However, if you choose the right outsourcer, you will get domestic Microsoft-certified consultants; support for more than 160 applications, including advanced-level Office 2007; training courses and awareness campaigns; after-hours support; no hold time; a call abandonment rate of .01 percent; and a 91 percent first-call resolution rate. Average cost per solution with this option is $25.

Here’s the poka-yoke: By hiring a migration partner, you will not have to hire extra staff (or fire them once it’s complete); you will not need to train your staff to an expert Office 2007 level; you will not have to pay overtime when call volume balloons during the initial migration phase; and, best of all, your employees will experience minimal downtime and very little lost productivity.♦

Read Schrage’s full article.

Download your free migration readiness kit.

MORE INFO IN: Office 2007 Migration Case Study | Office 2007 Migration Assurance Program | Migration Readiness Checklist | Migration Competitive Analysis | Contact PC Helps