Navigation needs to be a Natural Act!!!!

Last week I visited some sites and engineering houses as they developed new systems. What struck me was the amount of time, and effort we put into designing a forced navigation between screens and windows. Even though, I knew this in my mind, I asked Why?.

In designing navigational buttons,  thereby enforcing a method of navigating through the application, which then now needs to trained to the people. Why cannot the system has Natural navigation built from the application model.

So what is this about?

Simple in today’s environment we have a couple of areas effecting the operational environment:

• Rotating people are in locations, role shorter times
• Increase in responsibility and decision making requirements, requiring a significant increase in data and information the operator must absorb or react over.

Last week I discussed Advanced Process Graphics, and how the new coloring scheme where only exception is shown is key to a person’s day, not the pretty pictures, providing a practical way to address the second point of more information. This starts not just in the screen design but down in the data and information source so the system is managing by exception.

The top point I raised is the rotating staff, discussing this last week with a couple of customers, this is a huge issue, I have spoken before about Operator Training Systems, but along with that must come a “natural” navigation. The users need intuitive navigation around screens, accessing the information they need, to make the decision, and take the required action. The interface may not be the desktop or control room experience it may start there, but it may also be at home, on the web, or roaming.

Consider screens and navigation designed for the desktop, now consider the Ipad, where the real estate is smaller, experience is “touch not click”, the desktop design will probably not be practical. Does this mean as a designer you have design different windows, and especially different navigation experiences or has the paradigm changed that this one window must be able to hosted in both environments, and the navigation/ layout for the experience changes. Yes the day of the HMI Application is over, it’s layout and windows been specific to location/ device and experience.

Layouts need to define where windows appear, layouts will be associated with the device and person. Example: I may have my desktop control experience, but I will have my Ipad control experience, and a different one for industrial, mobile device experience. Each with their own layout, and associated navigation, yet the same windows and information can be accessed.

Model driven navigation is required, so as you drill through the experience, to different levels of the model, the navigational experience must evolve driven from  the model. This allows the evolution of the model to happen, with no change required to operational experience as the new model extensions will be naturally available.

People often ask me why cannot the classic InTouch application work for the modern HMI, well the HMI products like InTouch, Citect, Ifix etc were built for local, one experience, one device, that is why we are evolving the InTouch experience to modern requirement. Next week I want continue the discussion on the "Intutive" navigation concept.

Change in Reaction Time due Advanced Process Graphics

Change in Reaction Time due Advanced Process Graphics

The transformation to Advanced ProcessGraphics aligned to the level shift in operational responsibility to achieve the operational agility needed in the “Flexible Operational Team”. In the last month, it has been rewarding to see two customers embracing this technique with results of straightforward, responsive Navigation.

The diagram below shows the evolution of the HMI graphic, in the 80s it was what I call the black DCS screen, to 90’s and 2000’s which we have a photo like graphics and many colors, to the drive today of uncomplicated, 2D graphics.

When applied in practice, results of painless awareness become abundantly clear. Some companies have tested existing (90s) operational experiences and Advanced Process Graphics finding a 30+ minute improvement in responsiveness.  I was watching how an operator moved through a screen based on a condition. The situation came up on the main screen which was light grey, with a red highlight around the particular area that has an issue providing immediately awareness.The user drills into that areas screen seeing a blue symbol indicating a warning level of alarm condition on one equipment. Clicking on  the equipment, down the bottom of the layout the list of potential issues in dull grey, and one condition is highlighted with blue.

What was very clear the way in which the operator navigated he just followed the color, there was really no need to search a screen as everything was light grey except the high lighted area. Speaking with the operator, he said “he has come from a traditional black background screens(70s) the learning experience was easy as he did not learn how to navigate to screens, he just followed the situation (color)”.

I have also seen this on some experimental experiences in South Africa, showing the same results, this has made it black and white to me, that if we are to make our operational experiences inituative this is a good starting point.

The above diagram refers to two books the “High Performance HMI Handbook” explaining the why, and “ASM Guide” explaining the how, both a worthwhile read.  

Operator Training Systems become the Corner Stone for Management of Change to a Flexible Operational Team.

Over the last month I have hosted a number of customer workshops on the evolution of Operational Teams, which you have seen in the discussion over the last couple of months is going through a significant change.

I enjoy these discussions, and brainstorming, especially with groups who have been charged with Operational Performance, and they have moved away from grinding out more value from capital assets (this is a very mature area with asset management) and have shifted their focus to the Human Assets. It is funny to think 10 years ago we were talking “lights out manufacturing” without humans, the best comment I have heard to this notion is that “turning the lights out makes it hard for operators to find their way to the control room”. The real change is people have realized that complex / agile decisions needed today require the human brain, so the role of people in the aligning of an operational process is key.
Human roles are becoming shorter, many rotating sites due to expertise, and changes in practices coming about all the time due to regulations, or increased efficiency. The introduction of Remote Operational Centers and the fact that we have dynamic teams on site, as well as the virtual team see the diagram below.

What came up in all the workshops was not just the technology of collaboration, but the challenge of “Managing the Change” in operational culture. It is great to people recognizing this, as it is the biggest hurdle to success. Why you may ask? A key concepts in the new operational environment is the move to Advanced Process Graphics which are very different operational experience to the 3d effects of the 2000s. (see the diagram below shows the evolution of operational experience below ).

These new graphical approaches provide fast recognition and action of situations; as well companies are trying to gain style, layout, and visualization standards. So now an existing operator is now going to move from their existing interface to a new interface with different experience which should be more efficient so they can handle more information, but it will be a leap of change. These new layouts, and experiences will enable consistency of operations over sites, collberation, and increased efficiency.

In all the discussions the concept of the “Operator Training System” (OTS) comes to front of mind to be critical in this “Management of Change” and also the reduction in the “Time to Performance”, as illustrated in the diagram below. Often the teams have come in with the thought that the OTS is a nice to have, but as we get into the discussion the realization that it is not just for training, it will enable:

·      The new operational experience can be tested and trained against in as many situations as possible. Enabling a transition of the operator from the old to new collectrative Advanaced expereince. With the level of the operator being tracked to see when they reach a level of satisfaction that means they can switch.

·       It provides a safe environment to test, and validate the new operational experience, making sure that it has been well tested.

·       Enable the Training of Operational staff on real situations

·       The ability to report on each Operators capabilities and effectiveness on an ongoiing basis.

·       A safe real environment to enable “operational Innovation” by letting your best Operators get into situations and innovate better procedures or capture their procedure so you can set up a standard procedure for that situation. The OTS provides the critical environment for Innovation that of allowing experimentation in a safe way.

·         The ability for experienced operational people to be trained on new locations / sites prior to being transferred, this includes the 3d Virtual environments which provide the physical familiarity.

By the end of these workshops OTS moves up to not a nice to have but an essential component on the evolution of the Operational Experience. I hope you are looking at OTS in a different light, I cannot see companies doing this evolution without OTS.

Composite Frameworks What are They, How do they Play?

As we look at MES and Operational solutions the role of the consistent operational execution and experience is key to achieving operational consistency.

Traditionally companies have built User Interfaces to an API, with the calls needed to execution actions and transactions coded in. These have worked well especially within a plant. But a key to operational systems being effective and agile is their ability to adapt on a regular basis, this requires a sustainable and evolving system. This is especially important in form/ transaction activities where information is provided and where actions/ data input, and procedures  that need to be carried out. But the challengers of operational procedures:

ü  Operational Process cross-over functional domains and applications

ü  Lack of governance

ü  Agility

ü  Responsive manufacturing business processes

ü  Increase the performance of their people assets

 

So like the Business System who started introduce BPM (Business Process Modeling) leading companies in the industrial space are looking and asking why they cannot apply the same techniques in the Industrial/ production sector.

There is no reason! Yes the time line is more real time, triggers are real-time, and there are many roles with different time dimensions. But this also aligns with what the industrial world is very comfortable with that of “stable in control loops” we do this in automation with feedback (information) and correction (actionable procedures), what we are looking at are “operational loops”.

Providing a graphical configuration environment for the capture and defining of operational process including the validation of data input, and guide actions, working inline with the user Interface/ forms etc. Providing a framework for building of reusable forms, and reusable procedures that can be managed as templates and standards to enforce consistent operational practices. Empowering the operational domain people to develop, evolve and manage their procedures.

Most of all empowering the different roles in the plant, that operational close loop moving to an “activity” centric system where information, and action is driven from a consistent operational model and practices.