P&P August 2015

technology speaks

By William Carroll

“Drag-free Drift” In Delivering Human Services

F ly-fishing anglers know that pre- senting the fly to the trout with a drag-free drift is key to the art. The fly should float over the trout’s nose giving no sense it’s attached to a line. A drag-free drift sounds simple, but it is incredibly difficult. It takes practice, focus, and a strong will to overcome natural forces. Many factors are in play in, but let’s start by looking at three keys to tricking a wise old 20-inch rainbow trout: Š Š Presenting a drag-free drift fly to the waiting mouth of a hungry, but skeptical fish requires factoring in all disruptive environmental factors, thinking ahead, and developing strategies. How will wind, current, and natural impediments affect the course, time, and distance needed to deliver the fly? Š Š A drag-free drift requires constant mending. Once you lay the fly line on the water, you must make numerous small “mends” to the line to adjust to wind and other forces. These crucial small mends require focused attention to constantly changing conditions. Š Š Presenting a drag-free drift requires skill and trust for every foot of equipment from your hand and beyond—out 40 to 80 feet to the tiny fly at line end. The angler must understand how even small actions affect each piece of equipment out to the tip of the hook. The concept of a drag-free drift is very similar to how human service agencies are currently looking to innovate and streamline service delivery to citizens. Whether it’s no-touch processing, real-time eligi- bility, or shifting from case-based to task-based processing, the goal is the

Overlooking Reality When we turn to technological changes to improve human service delivery we often overlook a key reality: Technology, when done right, will optimize in the future, but not necessarily today. We embark on large technology transformations with grand vision statements, often encom- passing much more than simply new technology. Vision statements forecast significant changes in client behavior, worker skills, and even the outside world. Yet we expect the technology solution to immediately achieve the goals, in isolation of other key changes. In fly fishing, achieving the bug’s drag-free drift requires accounting for all potential variables that could affect the fly’s behavior as it makes its way to the rainbow trout tucked tight against the bank. It’s not enough to think only about the river current, ignoring the wind. It is not enough to cast perfectly, defying the wind, only to float to a

same: speed delivery, remove manual steps, and improve accuracy through automation. Plenty of technology tools and business-process theories pitch these goals, but usually these initia- tives fail to transform our delivery as we hope and expect. We get frustrated when an approach fails to land the big one. So let’s see if our concept of drag- free drift can help. Number one is making small mends to remedy strong and changing natural forces. In human service delivery you can’t just lay out the line and forget it. We often embark on change with a fixed mind set. If we include “pilots” or time for “feedback” we generally hope only for buy-in, not for opportunities to make mends that meet constantly changing and unpredictable natural elements. Instead, we need to build mends into our timeline and resourcing, ensuring that we communicate this expecta- tion to quickly head off the perception that mends indicate failure or lack of commitment.

See Drag-Free Drift on page 36

Photograph via Shutterstock

Policy&Practice   August 2015 26