No Shortcuts Allowed in Website Design

There are some tried and true ways to help prevent against disasters such as that which has befallen healthcare.gov.

Yesterday, in Why HealthCare.Gov Crashed & Burned, & How You Can Avoid That Fate, I touched on the management perils involved with so many contractors as well as site availability concerns. Today, let's look at the difficulties involved in accurate forecasting and dealing with siloed information.

Predicting the number of users for your companies' newly released tools should also be a simple calculation. How many potential users exist? Are you replacing an existing paper-based process? Delving into the existing number of steps and tasks completed daily, with reference to the process, should allow for a "best-case scenari" when launching a new interface or process online. A number of tools exist, allowing for "on demand" scaling of web and LAN/WAN based applications. Your "Go To" geek should be able to address scaling issues with ease, if expected adoption metrics can be estimated.

Dependencies between data silos, a key to failure for healthcare.gov, is a tough nut to crack. Traditionally, paper-based process allow for data staging between steps, normally managed by a well trained employee or team manager. Housing data in specifically crafted spreadsheets or disparate databases allows for a managed flow of information between process steps. Automating these steps well relies heavily on discovery and scope of work for the project. Rules, segmented into a number of "if-then-else" statements, must be carefully crafted. Allowing for the majority of contingencies and access to needed data in real time, taking into account the number of systems included in crafting health care coverage, indeed presents a challenge.

When planning a process for your company, such as price quoting or inventory availability, you must ensure the data needed to calculate the needed information is available in real-time. Depending on a person or department to respond to a needed variable breaks the system of real-time responses to live users.

The bottom line, when outlining a process to be automated, is discovery, scope, and testing:

• Carefully document the existing process prior to project scope (discovery)
• Review the process, with the algorithmic replacement of well-trained staff (scope)
• Diligently run the new tool through end to testing, with the existing process team (testing)

A server is the perfect employee. It does not need sleep or vacation days, does not get jealous when another (better) server sits next to it, and ironically does not need health insurance. Moving your traditionally departmental- or team-based processes to a highly available application or portal is a logical step for any size business.

Healthcare.gov, though imperfect, represents a positive step forward. Using current tools to solve historically tough problems is a tried-and-true method in the world of businesses of all sizes. Hopefully, Washington can continue to improve and modify healthcare.gov. Obviously it is a work in progress.