How to Use Technology to Eliminate Human Errors

Are you tired of wasting time and money reviewing environmental reports? All that extra time spent trying to find those foolish, human errors? Having to fix the same mistakes over and over? If so, you are not alone. This problem has bugged me throughout my career!

Mistakes are like a ticking time bomb that is just waiting to go off. Competitors, clients and regulators alike are all looking for your mistakes. Mistakes that make you look stupid. Mistakes that cost you time and money to fix!

We live in an era of rapid technological improvement. Everything that is routine, time consuming or error prone is being automated. Time consuming and mindless processes that used to take hours to complete are now finished in minutes. In this article I will show you how you can use new automation technology to eliminate those irritating human mistakes!

Automated Data Uploads

Manual data entry or cut and paste data entry processes are slow and fraught with human errors. New technology tools automatically upload laboratory generated electronic data files directly to a cloud database. When no human touches the data, opportunities for mistakes are eliminated.

New technology can also be used to upload historical data spreadsheets to the cloud database, in seconds. All of your data in one place and backed up in a secure cloud environment.

Automated Data Tables

Imbedded formulas in spreadsheets are problematic. Every time new data is appended to a table, formulas must be copied and checked. Technology can be used to automatically query the database and generate formatted data tables. Software compares the data to regulatory standards and highlights exceedences in red — so every reader has a clear understanding of the results.

Automated Contour Maps

Incorrectly plotted or contoured data is a common and often costly mistake. Contour map generators automatically plot the correct data at the correct location and mathematical algorithms automatically generate accurate contours. In the past, geologists resisted contouring programs because they did not allow for “geologic interpretation.” However, new technology now allows for contour customization but will not print contours where technically not precise.

Automated Statistics Generators

Many statistical software packages require separate data entry or formatting processes that are time consuming and subject to error. With new technology, statistics generators query the original database and automatically create charts and trend analyses for any item in the database over for any date range.

Automated Report Generator

Routine progress reports are often repetitive or contain similar information as previous reports. In the past, the easiest way to compile this type of report was to make a copy of a previous report, strip out the old data and fill in the new data. Unfortunately, these reports were often incomplete or were submitted with old data that had not been replaced. With modern report generators, data is automatically culled from the database, analyzed and summarized. Complete PDF reports can be created and wrapped up in one fully editable document.

How I am Solving the Human Error Problem

My vision is to utilize technology to eliminate the opportunity for human errors to occur in the first place. If we can change a process that involves humans manipulating data to a process that is fully automated, we eliminate those inadvertent mistakes.

I assembled a team of software engineers and we turned my vision into OptaHub.com. OptaHub is an exciting set of tools wrapped up into a single application. Check out this two-minute video on what OptaHub can do. For more detailed information visit our website OptaHub.com. Do you want to see how OptaHub can manage and automate your data? Contact us at support@optahub.com for a free demo.