Even then, an outsider's 'second opinion' can help prevent costly errors. Referrals from from local user groups or computer dealers are the best sources of names. Response time is another potential problem, he said. Automation is great . . . when it works. They have different ways of looking at information, different ways of analyzing the market.
Clients also have different ways of looking at the whole issue of automation.
Two years ago, Information Management automated several key areas of the institution's Bankruptcy Control Center, and in the process won a convert. Although the center's activity has increased by more than 50 percent, only one new staff member has been needed, he notes. For example, a ledger card system for tracking bankruptcy collections was replaced with an electronic application that closely matches the former method. With more than 2,500 cards and growing, the process of manually finding, filing and updating cards was a full-time job in itself. The computer calculates the current balance and even generates a number of summaries.