Symetri
I grew up in a rural setting and had a 12-bore shotgun from the age of 8, as it was a way to put food on the table. Whilst we can debate the morals of wild and farmed meat that comes wrapped in clingfilm from the supermarket, that is not the purpose of this article. This true story is about the importance of correct information in decision making.
I had just come home from school on a warm summer’s day when my father who worked shifts in a printing company asked, ‘Rabbit tonight?’ as he put our guns in the back of his Ford Cortina. It was a father and son ritual that we both enjoyed; walking through the fields and woodland where he had shooting rights, often not shooting anything, and just enjoying each other’s company and a walk in the countryside.
There was a particular spot where one was sure to see rabbits at dusk, so on this occasion it was fairly likely that dinner would be fresh rabbit.
The technique was to approach the field slowly and quietly via a private lane peering around the corner and down the gap between the crops and the hedgerow. The rabbits liked to eat the young shoots here and sure enough there was one. From the distance I couldn’t make out the details, but it was clearly an adult and had long ears, so I wondered whether it was a hare.
What happened next is best told over a pint in a pub. For a young boy it was exciting, terrifying, and upsetting all in one. What with the deer charging at me, my father deafening me by emptying his gun into it just over my head and shouting ‘re-load!’ along with un-printable expletives, followed by more gunfire and a chase; it is something I will never forget and never wish to repeat.
What I thought was either an adult rabbit or a hare, was in fact the head of a mature fallow deer; its body was in the tall sweetcorn and completely invisible, so all I could see was the head which looked exactly like a rabbit.
In our business lives we often have to make decisions based on limited information and if that information is out-of-date or just plain wrong the consequences can be dreadful. Can you for example, be certain that the document you are looking at is the latest version, or the approved one?
With people working from home the opportunity for documents to be copied many times, put in the wrong places, or named incorrectly are much higher than ever before, so the risk that you are acting on the wrong information has increased and some day that is going to hurt your business if you don’t address the problem.
We have a solution that can help! Our AEC document management system, Excitech DOCS is based on the incredibly easy to use and popular M-Files platform which ensures that there is a single source of the truth. Our software system intelligently stores data based on what something is as opposed to where it is ensuring that every document or drawing is the one true version every single time.
Learn more about our document management software, Excitech Docs here.
