|
Hi-tech
gadgets: Necessity or fashion?
Automation
that works in the west may not really be suitable for the overpopulated
countries in the east where the prime concern is to suitably engage the
unemployed, writes Mohan Babu
Dignity of labour
in the west has a different meaning, as opposed to what we are used to in India.
Here one has to service one’s own needs; servants and domestic help is largely
unheard of. Starting from picking up your bags at the airport, to bagging your
own thrash, and cleaning and maintaining the house and apartment, one is
responsible for everything. Here most people, regardless of their position or
status, drive their own cars, take out their own trash, walk their dogs, put the
laundry and dishes in washers and dishwashers. I don’t mean to imply that there
is absolutely no domestic help available in the west. However, the cleaning
services can be prohibitively expensive and not affordable for day-to-day
maintenance and servicing.
Any service that
involves human labour is expensive. Minimum wage laws in the west ensure that
even the most menial jobs are paid “minimum wages”. Incidentally, the Federal
minimum wage, last raised by the US Congress in 1997 is currently set at $5.15
per hour. Most states also have their own state statues that allow the minimum
wage to be greater than the Federal rate, for example in California, the current
minimum wage is set at $6.25/hour. No wonder, even mundane services involving
humans are expensive, for example a haircut at the local barbershop can cost
upwards of $15.
The shortage of
skilled labour along with the high costs involved in employing humans has
ensured the automation of most mundane tasks. Most businesses try to minimise
the human element as much as they can. For instance, most parking lots are
automated, with cameras instead of humans monitoring enforcement. Interestingly,
a novel, but controversial idea, currently being tried out in a number of cities
across the US is the ‘traffic ticket by mail’ concept. A number of traffic
lights have been fitted with video cameras and motion sensors that not only
detect vehicles trying to jump the signal, but also capture their license plate
numbers and automatically generate and mail traffic tickets that are hard to
dispute. The flip side of this is that the hard-pressed police officers avoid
the drudgery of manning the traffic signals and are happier using their skills
for other police-work.
Life without
domestic help can be tough, especially in nuclear families where both partners
work full time. To aid in household chores, gadgets like vacuum cleaners,
dishwashers, washers and dryers are de rigueur. People with huge lawns and yards
also invest in automated lawnmowers and snows ploughs, and take the time and
energy to maintain them. Gadgets are generally designed to be user-friendly and
automatic requiring little human input or intervention.
The advent of
technology and proliferation of tools of communication like e-mails and instant
messengers has not only changed the way we communicate but also had an
unintended consequence — vanishing of the tribe of stenographers/typists. This
is especially true amongst younger executives and professionals who are becoming
comfortable with the Internet, e-mail and the use of word processing software
tools, finding it more convenient to type up a note themselves, rather than
dictate it to a steno. Of course the role of stenos are getting expanded, for
instance in our group we have one steno/pa/office manager who help about 80
people including the senior manager, all the managers, leads and professionals.
Automation that
works in the west may not really be suitable for the overpopulated countries in
the east where the prime concern is to harness the human potential and employ a
burgeoning population effectively and productively. In India, I find it
particularly amusing that some people take pride in having all the household
gadgets and a horde of servants to operate the gadgets! Most Indians who visit
the west are enamoured by the gadgets; little realising that the gadgets are
just tools without a personal touch that human services provide. Some people do
not realise that in the west it is the necessity and convenience that leads
people to use gadgets and not merely fashion alone.
One area that is
not really susceptible to automation is the hospitality industry and other
service sectors that require a “human face”. Those in the hospitality industry,
especially in the west, value the importance of the human touch and are wary of
automating the front-end of operations, hence we still see receptionists,
bellhops and doormen greeting visitors. Interestingly the push for automation in
the west has lead to a renewed interest in outsourcing, especially in labour-intensive
technical areas.
Case in point, a
number of Indian companies have successfully set up call centres to handle calls
for their clients in the US who need to service the needs of their customers in
real time. Call centres require a whole army of trained and articulate workers
to perform a task that can be quite repetitive and companies in the US find it
extremely hard to train, motivate and retain workers for their call centre
operations.
|
