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Ask HN: What manual processes would you automate in your company?

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Re: Ask HN: What manual processes would you automate in your company?

#81

Post by iamdave »

ju-st wrote: post #78

Ordering of stuff from central IT. I waited 3 months for my RSA token (which I need for working remotely). My boss waited 4 months for a dev server he desperately needs for a customer project. The request for the server was only processed when my boss talked to some other guy who knows someone from the central IT department. And the requested server wasn't even physical hardware but a virtual server!

I waited 3 months for my RSA token (which I need for working remotely). My boss waited 4 months for a dev server he desperately needs for a customer project.

Pardon my language: holy shit.

How large is your organization??? All I do at work is build dev environments, manage credential storage, and every now and then get roped into server upgrades kicking and screaming...four months for a freaking dev environment???

FOUR? How does this happen?

Re: Ask HN: What manual processes would you automate in your company?

#82

Post by robalfonso »

GuiA wrote: post #66
BjoernKW wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you tell what the reason behind that policy is? Whenever I hear something like this I like to challenge it by the following: Working remotely should be the default, not the outlier. If your organisation requires personal presence something in your organisation is broken (management processes, the way people interact, obsolete tools etc.). Fix that instead of patching what's broken by mandating personal presence.…

My organization requires personal presence because we work on prototype hardware that costs several hundreds of thousands/millions of dollars to make, so we can't just make one for each of us and bring it home. (And even if we could, these things require regular fixing, and if I'm in Japan and the girl who knows how to resolder a certain component in Chile, that's not very practical) Sometimes I can work from home if…

You clearly don't have site to site mass materializers (ie star trek transporters) then you could just move it to your location when you need it. Get on the ball!

Re: Ask HN: What manual processes would you automate in your company?

#83

Post by kzisme »

stronglikedan wrote: post #72
BjoernKW wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you tell what the reason behind that policy is? Whenever I hear something like this I like to challenge it by the following: Working remotely should be the default, not the outlier. If your organisation requires personal presence something in your organisation is broken (management processes, the way people interact, obsolete tools etc.). Fix that instead of patching what's broken by mandating personal presence.…

The reasoning behind our COO's no(low)-remote policy is that he cannot tell if someone is simply punching in and then watching TV. Meanwhile, he is oblivious to the dozens of in-house workers who are punching in and chatting, doing things on their phone, anything but their work, etc. I have one employee who was grandfathered in, since he's been working remotely since before the COO's random policy decision, and he's…

Yeah I feel it depends on the company you work for. It seems most companies are "butt's in chairs" and just want you there...

There are loads of people who watch Netflix all day at my company, but full time remote isn't offered to everyone.

Re: Ask HN: What manual processes would you automate in your company?

#84

Post by cakoose »

BjoernKW wrote: post #45
Johnny555 wrote: post #18

I'd get rid of the manual process of driving to the office every day and replace it with collaboration tools to let people telecommute full time. We actually use such tools, but have a "no remote workers" policy. Occasional work from home is fine, just not full time.

Can you tell what the reason behind that policy is? Whenever I hear something like this I like to challenge it by the following: Working remotely should be the default, not the outlier. If your organisation requires personal presence something in your organisation is broken (management processes, the way people interact, obsolete tools etc.). Fix that instead of patching what's broken by mandating personal presence.…

I'm not against remote work, but one thing I notice is that it's more efficient to hash out ideas with someone in person.

Why do you categorically say that something is broken if it requires personal presence?

Re: Ask HN: What manual processes would you automate in your company?

#85

Post by devopsproject »

jasonallen wrote: post #67
blakesterz wrote: post #56

Onboarding of new customers . I feel like we must do this different than most places because I've not been even able to find a good system to even track the steps and things I do to get them set up and started. I've tried just about every task and project manager out there, most of them were good enough, but nothing was ever perfect. Using Basecamp now, has proven to be " good enough " so far (support has been perfec…

I'm confused by what you mean. I'd argue that onboarding new customers should be your core competency, the focus of your main product. What am I missing?

> What am I missing?

The human element.

We make an application that makes use of folder on a network share. One of the developers here types up instructions each time we install a new site. If the customer has trouble or opts to have our help, they will connect remotely to create a folder and some sub folders. This takes anywhere from a few minutes to over an hour if they have trouble connecting remotely.

I mentioned in a developer meeting that we should create an install script for the network folders. It would save the company hundreds of hours or work.

One developed asked how I would do it. A generally competent developer, who has worked with files and folders for many years, asked how we could deliver a program to create folders.

I nearly walked out (and we still dont have a 4 line script to create the folders we need)

Re: Ask HN: What manual processes would you automate in your company?

#88

Post by edoceo »

cakoose wrote: post #84
BjoernKW wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you tell what the reason behind that policy is? Whenever I hear something like this I like to challenge it by the following: Working remotely should be the default, not the outlier. If your organisation requires personal presence something in your organisation is broken (management processes, the way people interact, obsolete tools etc.). Fix that instead of patching what's broken by mandating personal presence.…

I'm not against remote work, but one thing I notice is that it's more efficient to hash out ideas with someone in person. Why do you categorically say that something is broken if it requires personal presence?

Hour long video chat helps, always on chat. Then another video chat with whiteboard

Re: Ask HN: What manual processes would you automate in your company?

#89

Post by wellsthrowaway »

iamdave wrote: post #81
ju-st wrote: post #78

Ordering of stuff from central IT. I waited 3 months for my RSA token (which I need for working remotely). My boss waited 4 months for a dev server he desperately needs for a customer project. The request for the server was only processed when my boss talked to some other guy who knows someone from the central IT department. And the requested server wasn't even physical hardware but a virtual server!

I waited 3 months for my RSA token (which I need for working remotely). My boss waited 4 months for a dev server he desperately needs for a customer project. Pardon my language: holy shit. How large is your organization??? All I do at work is build dev environments, manage credential storage, and every now and then get roped into server upgrades kicking and screaming...four months for a freaking dev environment ??? F…

At Wells Fargo, I'd kill for a dev environment in general. We only do production-classified-as-dev. And 4 months? Slow down! We're six months...if you're lucky.

Re: Ask HN: What manual processes would you automate in your company?

#90

Post by 0xdeadbeefbabe »

BjoernKW wrote: post #45
Johnny555 wrote: post #18

I'd get rid of the manual process of driving to the office every day and replace it with collaboration tools to let people telecommute full time. We actually use such tools, but have a "no remote workers" policy. Occasional work from home is fine, just not full time.

Can you tell what the reason behind that policy is? Whenever I hear something like this I like to challenge it by the following: Working remotely should be the default, not the outlier. If your organisation requires personal presence something in your organisation is broken (management processes, the way people interact, obsolete tools etc.). Fix that instead of patching what's broken by mandating personal presence.…

> If your organisation requires personal presence something in your organisation is broken

Don't you wonder why politicians hold town meetings in person?

Edit: Also, if your org doesn't require personal presence it is vulnerable to some attacks.

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