Human Aspects of Information Technology

This is an archived post from February 2009 :

I have mentioned the topic in my previous posts at my BLOGSPOT BLOG and I kept working on it. Finally things took shape and I addressed a Radio Talk show at Planet Satyam, a Radio/Live webcast portal. I got rewarded with a STAR award for the same, so I would like to pen down a little about the whole ASPECT.

Most of what I have spoken/written and am presenting below about HASE , are not my original ideas, I am only showcasing/quoting it to the world for awareness/promotion of the topic in discussion.I have used the first hand knowledge and lecture notes of Prof Sanjay Goel, who inspired me yet again and motivated me to write about HASE. I have used various internet sources to study the topic and am using the knowledge I gained from them, for my details.

HASE, as we called in JIIT in the final semester, under Prof Sanjay Goel – HOD (CS & IT), deals with other side of technology, the Human Aspects, and I try to share my understanding of the subject with real life examples and scenarios , dividing the topic in three parts :

Professional
Social and
Personal

Here is how I outline it :
Computers have become an essential part of all the engineered products and if we classify, there are four key components which collectively formulate an information systems :

Hardware,
Software,
Tactic/Methodology and
People.

There has been a gradual advancement in the skills to build such systems, primarily by

Developing consistent hardware,
Second by developing robust and precise programming languages, and
Third by the use of well-connected development methodologies.

To tryst there has been a lack of prominence of the ‘people component’ in software engineering of any information technology based system. With gradual maturity in Software Industry and community, it is accepted that the people concerned in software development processes deserve more concentration and attention than the processes or technologies. We hear more and more about failures due to computers: Software errors have resulted in loss of life, destruction of property, failure of businesses, and environmental harm. Computers now have the potential for destabilizing our financial system.

What is HASE and why is it important to be educated about?
Human Aspects of Software Engineering details software engineering from the perception of those involved in the process: individuals, teams, customers, and the organization. It covers the problems, questions, and conflicts that arise during various phases of Software Development Life Cycle. The importance of these issues is widely acknowledged in the industry and academia, because most or all of the failures of software systems can be traced to human factors.

PROFESSIONAL ASPECTS OF HASE:

Definition of profession from Wikipedia….
Profession is an occupation that requires extensive training and the study and mastery of specialized knowledge, and usually has a professional association, ethical code and process of certification or licensing and that is exactly what various corporate trainings aim at in worldwide MNC’s.
There are various Professional dilemmas we go through every now and then. Let us try to answer the followings:

Companies fire fresh recruits immediately after their failure in training. Should they not be more careful while choosing?????
Xyz felt that there were problems with the software project, but could not decide when to reveal it to the management. If he would discuss this while it was just a suspicion, he may be over-reacting to a situation; or if he left it too late, it may be impossible to resolve the difficulties.…
Whistle blowing is exposing some unsolicited practices that go on inside any organization, and being discreet at the same time. Do it or not to do it?

.. And I am sure many of you would be relating to one of your own professional dilemma by now. Let me now highlight the ACM/IEEE ethics laid down for Software Engineers which every Software Engineer must be aware of, keeping in mind the aforementioned points for bringing respect to our profession and maintain highest order of dignity and humanity and avoid all sorts of professional dilemmas. (I wonder how is it that NONE of the IT professionals, whatever be their hierarchy, are aware about its existence) :

PUBLIC – Software engineers shall act consistently with the public interest.
CLIENT AND EMPLOYER – Software engineers shall act in a manner that is in the best interests of their client and employer consistent with the public interest.
PRODUCT – Software engineers shall ensure that their products and related modifications meet the highest professional standards possible.
JUDGMENT – Software engineers shall maintain integrity and independence in their professional judgment.
MANAGEMENT – Software engineering managers and leaders shall subscribe to and promote an ethical approach to the management of software development and maintenance.
6. PROFESSION – Software engineers shall advance the integrity and reputation of the profession consistent with the public interest.
COLLEAGUES – Software engineers shall be fair to and supportive of their colleagues.
SELF – Software engineers shall participate in lifelong learning regarding the practice of their profession and shall promote an ethical approach to the practice of the profession.

SOCIAL ASPECTS OF HASE:

The social aspect of HASE speaks volume of Peer pressure (friends, group, society or any other outer influence) and other psychological and sociological issues confronted by Software Engineers in life. Many would quietly agree of peer pressure driving them to stay late in office and do the work that is not supposed to be done by them otherwise. There are many social, environmental, and ethical consequences of computer technology that I shall be highlighting in “The killer Robot case” ,the overuse of resources such as paper, petroleum, electricity, deforestation for ‘I.T. workspace buildings’ , piracy, privacy, hacking, etc. No light is being thrown on the existence of very famous Digital divide which is increasing very speedily .There are numerous social responsibilities and of software engineers towards nature. HASE teaches us about Risks and liabilities of computer-based systems, various technological disasters, software failure. Highlighting some points of HASE about how IT can help in sustainability:

Enhancing awareness.
Using IT for holistic system modeling and simulation.
Reduce the paper needs.
Reduce the fuel/energy needs.
Reduce the travel needs.
Green IT processes (IT manufacturing, deployment, and hardware replacement etc.) Sensitive and responsive to sustainability.
Green Software engineering (developing efficient code that gives new life to existing hardware rather than create the need to replace it)

I for one always TURN OFF my computer when I leave office, even if I leave early, I do not worry about my communicator status and turn off the machine. I encourage all my colleagues to do the same.

There is a very famous fictitious “The Killer Robot Case” by Richard G. Epstein, in which the ROBOT operator gets KILLED by the robot while operating it due to various reasons. The book has various illustrations on the internet. Central to the theme of the book is the idea that new media has had a dramatic impact and has not been fully realized. Let me very quickly review the book:

At Silicon Techtronic’s, the robotics division chief, Johnson, put pressure on the project manager Reynolds to finish Robbie CX 30 – a robot project by January. Johnson hired 20 new programmers in June against Reynolds’ will, by shifting resources. Johnson only knew manufacturing hardware. One cannot speed software coding by adding more programmers.
Programmer was a prima donna: could not accept criticism or his own fallibility and under pressure to finish project on time
The project was controversial from the beginning
Jan Anderson, a programmer, was fired after she attacked project manager Reynolds on his decision to use the waterfall methodology versus the prototype methodology.
Reynolds was replacing a dead project manager as a cost saving measure instead of hiring someone from outside the company. He never worked with robotics before.
Tester faked the test results under pressure from the manager and then resigned. This was revealed from the email which got leaked through the office mailboxes.
In the end, the robot operator, Bart Matthews, was decapitated and killed by his robot, Robbie CX30, while at work as he failed to switch on the Num-lock key light and hence the robot malfunctioned.
A programmer, Randy Samuels, who wrote the faulty code at Silicon Techtronic’s, was indicted for manslaughter.

Who is to be blamed?

The programmer who made a careless mistake?
The designer?
The robotics division?
The company?
The operator of the robot? The faulty knowledge transfer to the operator?
Or the robot?

Ethical issues:

Email privacy
Professional ethics: delivering bug-free software
Plagiarism-intellectual property
Honor confidentiality
ACM code of ethics

Many issues in the book fall cleverly short of a conclusion and force the reader to ask questions such as:

Who gets held responsible for computers/”intelligent” machines that malfunction and cause harm (even death) due to faulty or malicious programming?
Is the current global political paradigm equipped to handle social issues on a virtual global network? If not, what authoritative entity will? Can?
Does High technology dull our sensitivity to the real world?
Are computers and parallel technologies changing the way we think for the better?
What “Human Being” skills (like conversation) are being lost because of computer technologies?
What prevents artificial intelligence from becoming artificial stupidity?

These questions may seem offensive to individuals who categorize robustly with automation but they do need to be asked and the answers need to be thoroughly introspective. Can all the technologies in all of history steal our humanity? There comes a point when one needs to apprehend the alliance of being human and the vital significance of using the on/off lever. The control creature exercise is and always has been an issue of self-control/ethical behavior. Artificial Intelligence and computing in general should stay in their places as tools for humans.

PERSONAL ASPECTS OF HASE:

Coming to the thirds part, the personal aspects of HASE talks about Value orientations of individuals as to why be personal values important in life and how they reflect in professional life.
Values must be activated in order to affect behavior. Remember when in kindergarten or grade one, you used to greet your teacher with a loud rhyme of good morning teacher? Personal values can be earned anywhere, from school/college, family, friends, religion, culture, etc. Anything relating to a moral practice can be referred to personal values. Personal values make the real you.

Personal aspect of HASE talks about organizational values as basic requirement for any organization to grow without which there would be no respect for any organization and the world would look at the organization as any other shop where they sell rotten potatoes. If each individual will start following his/her own PERSONAL VALUE system in professional life, there will be a complete mismatch in the professional goals and most plans would fail just in an attempt to get everyone together. Hence both, personal values and organizational values, need to go hand in hand for individual growth and the growth of the organization.

HASE helps us to understand various Personality theories. To brief personality theory, there exist 2 kinds of people in IT industry, type A and type B. Type A are those who are impatient, time conscious, and very insecure about their status and position, leading to mental mayhem and fight with self. Type B are people who are over peaceful with self and go careless about their status and work resulting in firing and loss of job, hence, the ‘human’ factor.
Most important of all, the personal aspect of HASE highlights the importance of APPRAISAL. I have read a story of 2 people who worked day and night, literally, day and night, for the delivery of a particular project. They forgot to sleep, eat and put their work ahead of everything else, since it was very critical for their company and circle’s reputation. The project did excellent and brought accolades from all around. At the time of appraisal, they were poorly rated on baseless and non existing reasons. Those who boosted them with motivating speeches during the project execution now turned their back to these two. Poor fellows could never get to know the real reason because of hierarchical structure and more because they had to see through the 1 year bond that they had with their company, so all they did was, said “let it be” and moved on. But never again, could they respect their reporting manager or the work, hence their attitude completely changed and excellent, innocent, enthusiastic young minds were guttered to hatred and dislike for the otherwise good industry.

Lets just peep into one such methodology AGILE SOFTWARE DEVELOPMENTwhich has constantly been a hot topic of debate as against SDCL approach. Those who hold top hierarchical positions are out rightly against the promotion of AGILE methodology. AGILE methodology, and particularly the SCRUM flavor is : SELF ORGANIZING and NON HIERARCHICAL. It promotes FACE to FACE, verbal communication over the traditional written communication. Everything in AGILE approach falls in line with HUMAN factor and I did my best to promote the same through my session deliveries and informal talks with colleagues.

CONCLUSION:

Let me leave you at this provoked thought … The rising significance of computers in contemporary society makes the study of Computer Ethics essential when it comes to issues related to the profession such as safety, security, privacy, environmental impact and quality and also in the everyday use of computers –personal or social which gives rise to numerous ethical dilemmas. Every organization should aim at HASE as an important benchmark and include an ethics courses in science and engineering and hence increase the ability of professionals to recognize and solve ethical problems, to accept different moral perspectives and to adopt ethical pluralism. It would develop the skill and pattern of thinking rationally about ethical issues and in that way prepares software professionals, immaterial of their hierarchical status in any organization, for the challenges of their profession.