The network should facilitate direct communication, removing the distortion caused when information is passed upward through an organizational hierarchy. One of the primary barriers to communication is the global configuration of companies. Technology can help bridge distance and time zones. A system that is too complex is a system that won't be used. Simplicity is a virtue.
Humans learn best, and teach best, when they can think freely.
The system should handle the translation, not the user. Every AstraZeneca site accesses these data using the same portal, facilitating global communication and making system maintenance easier for the company's informatics staff. Yet Clifford Baron, director of product marketing at Applied Biosystems' Informatics Division, notes that portals should not be viewed as a panacea. The great unsolved problem is how to represent data in more meaningful 'evidence networks' that can make implicit relationships between data more obvious. Informatics groups have traditionally had little problem databasing results, and instrumentation now automates most data capture and processing.