“There are two Brendas - their job is to make spreadsheets in the Finance department. Well, not quite - they add the months and categories to empty spreadsheets, then they ask the other departments to fill in their sales numbers every month so it can be presented to management.
“The two Brendas don’t seem to talk, otherwise they would realize that they’re both asking everyone for the same information, twice. And they’re so focused on their little spreadsheet worlds that neither sees enough of the bigger picture to say, ‘Wait… couldn’t we just automate this so we don’t need to do this song and dance every month? Then we wouldn’t need two people in different parts of the company compiling the same data manually.’
“But that’s not what Brenda was hired for. She’s a spreadsheet person, not a process fixer. She just makes the spreadsheets.”
We need fewer Brendas, and more people who can automate away the need for them.
“There are two Brendas - their job is to make spreadsheets in the Finance department. Well, not quite - they add the months and categories to empty spreadsheets, then they ask the other departments to fill in their sales numbers every month so it can be presented to management.
“The two Brendas don’t seem to talk, otherwise they would realize that they’re both asking everyone for the same information, twice. And they’re so focused on their little spreadsheet worlds that neither sees enough of the bigger picture to say, ‘Wait… couldn’t we just automate this so we don’t need to do this song and dance every month? Then we wouldn’t need two people in different parts of the company compiling the same data manually.’
“But that’s not what Brenda was hired for. She’s a spreadsheet person, not a process fixer. She just makes the spreadsheets.”
We need fewer Brendas, and more people who can automate away the need for them.