Measuring and improving data entry productivity

The handbook, Measuring and Improving Data Entry Productivity, shows data entry project leaders how to measure the productivity benefits that accrue from improved data entry operations, mainly those that stem from forms automation and automated remittance processing. In particular, it focuses on the productivity benefits created by enhanced data entry ergonomics. It covers the different types of operational environments (e.g.: heads down, key from image (KFI), double key verify, etc). It analyzes productivity benefits derived from automating these operations-hard dollar, soft dollar, and strategic-and describes how they are realized and measured at various levels of corporate use: stand alone, departmental, and enterprise-wide.

PROVIDING TOOLS AND TECHNIQUES

Measuring and Improving Data Entry Productivity provides a set of tools for measuring the benefits of improved data entry and a means for measuring increased productivity, including ergonomic factors such as reducing eye movements and keystrokes. It tells how to set parameters and benchmarks for measuring these factors and provides a methodology for analyzing, valuing, and tweaking data entry productivity. It describes how to build a model for calculating productivity improvements and related benefits over various project lifecycles to determine the impact of measurable improvements on ROI and cash flow.

FOCUS ON DATA ENTRY ERGONOMICS

As the forms processing software marketplace becomes increasingly more competitive, the issue of maximizing manual data input KFI speed becomes more important to end users. To this end, the use of graphical user interfaces (GUIs) that optimizes data entry ergonomics is paramount. Along these lines, Measuring and Improving Data Entry Productivity analyzes the types of KFI and ICR verification GUIs offered by today's forms automation vendors and points out their ergonomic strengths and weaknesses with respect to maximizing human data entry productivity.

SURVEYS AND STUDIES

Measuring and Improving Data Entry Productivity takes advantage of existing survey data plus an electronic survey of its members that TAWPI conducted. In the survey, data entry managers and users answer questions about:

* How they currently measure data entry productivity and other benefits;

* The kinds of productivity benefits that members have already experienced from technology improvements;

* How experienced benefits differed from (or matched) expectations;

* The magnitude of productivity improvements that members desire to receive from a given investment in technology implementation and process redesign, i.e., what is the minimum ROI they expect to obtain; how fast a payback do they require, etc.

In addition, the handbook makes use of real-life case studies that show the business process reengineering benefits that originate from improving forms processing and remittance processing operations. Each case study provides a clear illustration of how to quantify benefits and how to explicitly define the "before" and "after" data entry parameters of work processes that have been automated. Furthermore, to give the reader a thorough understanding of the industry terms of use, an up-to-date glossary is provided at the end of the book. Regardless of how automated their data entry operation is, or what kind of a user reads this book, Measuring and Improving Data Entry Productivity has something to offer anyone who wants to improve their organization's data entry productivity.