The Case of the Case Software

 

It was a dark and stormy mid-afternoon. I was sitting at my desk, staring at the etching on the frosted glass window of my office door, rotagitsevnI etavirP, yrrebpsaR .T ylnatS, when a shadowy figure let himself in.

“You Raspberry?”

“Whom did you come here to see?”

“Raspberry.”

“Whose name is on the building directory for this office?”

“Raspberry.”

“Whose name is on the door?”

“Raspberry.”

“Why are you asking, then, if I’m Raspberry?”

“’Cuz I need to know. You Raspberry?”

“Yes, I’m Stanly Raspberry” I sighed. “What can I do for you?”

The shadowy figure strode up to my desk, sat down in my cane-bottom chair, and began talking excitedly.

“It’s not what you can do for me that brought me here” he began. “It’s what I can do for you!”

“What’s all this?” I asked, as he dropped a series of colorful brochures on my desk.

“It’s the most recent breakthrough in crime-solving software. We call it the Crime Reporting and Adducement Program.”

“Wait, you have developed software that helps solve cases?”

“Not just specific cases – it solves entire groups of crime!” the C.R.A.P. salesman maintained. “We based it on those project management software systems that expanded to program management.”

“Wait a second …” I objected. “In order to design a computer program that can solve an individual case, let alone a collection of similar ones, it would have to know what types of information are needed, much less how to collect the data itself. How on earth does it purport to pull that off?”

“Oh, these crimes aren’t that different” the salesman began earnestly. “Thy all involve one or more perps, one or more victims, they have to take place at a certain time, and at a certain place.”

“Yes, that’s all true” I replied. “But that’s about where their similarities end. The whole point of being a Private Investigator – similar to being a project manager, I would assume – is to respond to the wildly and widely differing circumstances presented for each project or case. The diversity of information needs is so vast, you couldn’t possibly…”

“Which is why we have designed this software to mirror program or portfolio management software. As we all know, the point of all management is to maximize shareholder wealth, so the majority of management information can come from the General Ledger. But, for the unexpected, everything else can come from the risk analysis, right? Well, our software uses the crime database and records as the substitute for the GL, and borrow from the risk managers their techniques for all of the rest! It can’t miss!”

“Look, mister…”

“Call me Melvyn.”

“Okay, Melvyn, first of all, the point of all management is NOT to maximize shareholder wealth, and secondly, even if it were, no one computer program could possibly provide a comprehensive, program or portfolio-wide information stream that could lead to an informed decision on any issue under every circumstance. The diversity of problems, not to mention the decision-style of the managers confronting them, renders such tools as capable of helping, but far, far from being able to solve these cases on their own.”

Melvyn rolled his eyes, and sighed.

“How can you expect to solve anything without this kind of information?”

“I collect ‘this kind of information’ all the time, thank you. They’re known as ‘clues,’ and, unless you can demonstrate how your software acquires or sorts them better than I can, I’m afraid I’m not interested in your software.”

“You do not appear to be even in possession of a personal computer.”

“Another reason why I’m not interested.”

Melvyn scooped up his brochures, headed for the door, and turned around.

“You realize that your strategies in solving cases are utterly at odds with both prevalent risk management theory, as well as university professors who write textbooks about quantitative analysis in business (strikethrough) case-solving.”

“Yeah, I’ll make sure I steer clear of them when I’m out doing my work – if I actually encounter them, of course.”