{"id":12223,"date":"2015-12-16T14:53:05","date_gmt":"2015-12-16T20:53:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/?p=12223"},"modified":"2020-02-20T14:55:16","modified_gmt":"2020-02-20T20:55:16","slug":"it-automation-absurdity-and-the-5-whys","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.planview.com\/it-automation-absurdity-and-the-5-whys\/","title":{"rendered":"IT Automation, Absurdity, and the 5 Whys"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Automation is a way to improve a process by reducing or eliminating the need for manual effort. It can improve the speed or accuracy of a repeatable process, freeing your resources to focus on more nuanced work. \u00a0Automation can also help make it easy for anyone to jump into a process with little to no prior knowledge.<\/p>\n

The value of automation is clear, but it\u2019s often\u00a0difficult to determine what should be automated \u2014 and in what order. The 5 Whys is a helpful thinking tool that we use at Planview AgilePlace to help uncover the root causes of problems and prioritize them in a methodical way.<\/p>\n

Humans are Terrible Robots<\/h3>\n

Most IT team members I know are excited about their field because of the interesting problems that need to be solved. \u00a0Unfortunately, a lot of their time is spent on tedious, repetitive work that\u2019s neither fun nor interesting \u2014 but still needs to get done.<\/p>\n

Let\u2019s face it \u2014 humans are terrible robots. We get bored and frustrated when we have to perform repetitive work. It\u2019s especially annoying when we have to rework something because of a mistake we\u2019ve made. \u00a0That is, if we can spot it \u2014 \u00a0human error can be hard to track down. For this type of work, you can alleviate your stress by letting the automation robots handle the repetitive and tedious stuff.<\/p>\n

Let me be clear: I\u2019m not talking about evil robots taking over our jobs \u2014 robots are terrible humans, too. There will never be a shortage of problems in our field that require the creative problem-solving that only humans can provide. Adding IT automation allows the team to focus on problems that add value and require creative problem-solving \u2014 while improving the speed and accuracy of the more repetitive\u00a0tasks.<\/p>\n

Identifying Friction<\/h3>\n

Building out automation in your organization can be overwhelming. Analysis paralysis can happen when trying to decide where automation can add value.<\/p>\n

One way to find the key spots where automation adds the most value is to focus on removing unnecessary friction. Friction can be anything that bugs the team, is time consuming, isn\u2019t clear to everybody, needs to go away, or requires sharing knowledge that isn\u2019t easy to share. Once the main friction points\u00a0are identified and prioritized, determine a way that automation can help reduce friction in that one, specific spot. Keep iteratively exposing and automating away friction until you run out of sensible action items.<\/p>\n

These common friction points are opportunities for automation in many IT organizations:<\/p>\n