I recently started a new job, in a new city. So those lesson plans I spent all summer putting together saw only one semester of use. Well, I hope my replacement finds them helpful. I've moved on to a federal internship. Not often one goes up from instructor to intern. But, in beginning this job, I've noticed a bizarre trend. I spent almost two weeks filling out forms, online forms. There are several different human resources programs; different systems for pay, retirement, health insurance, life insurance, and other benefits; at least four different systems for training; and none of these software packages or databases communicates with the others, or if it does it does so poorly.
It's been just a few weeks and already I cannot remember how many different systems I've been registered or filed in. I was struck, reading the user manual for one of at least four different document tracking and storage systems in place, how utterly nonsensical all of this is. Why have a system that is organized like this at all? And since we're here to discuss science fiction from a practical, engineering standpoint, let's ask the obvious question: how would a better system work? How would a system designed to utilize a computer system correctly and efficiently work? And ultimately the question I've been asking myself every time I learn anything about the modern US military: how would Starfleet do it?
Usually the answer is the exact opposite of what's going on here.
