Knowledge can be organized, condensed, and made "user friendly" by a number of techniques. Information that CANNOT BE READILY ACCESSED when and where we need it WILL NOT HELP our decision-making!

A fantastic technique, particularly in the world of complex, technology-based business processes, is the organization of information as "baseline & change".

Countless Examples

There are countless common examples to illustrate the principle. Here are just a few:

• An Electro-Cardiogram. Doctors recommend that people have one made when they are young and healthy! This earlier measurement serves as a baseline against which later tests can be interpreted in terms of any change.
  

• MPEG/Digital Video. You may have noticed that "tuning" in a television channel via digital cable or satellite may take a couple of seconds before sound and picture appears. This is because digital video is stored as a series of infrequent baseline images followed by just information about changes to the picture!
  

• An old-fashioned "dial" combination lock - you can't just start dialing in the combination. You first have to restore the tumblers to a starting, or baseline, configuration. This is usually done by at least three complete turns of the dial in a particular direction. The proper turns to the right and to the left moves the tumblers in a consistent fashion from the baseline configuration.
  

• Experienced hikers avoid being seriously lost in the woods by consciously identifying baselines. They may, for example, note that a stream runs throughout the middle of the area they walk. A road bounds the west side of the area. A cleared area and a subdivision bounds the east. They are then free to explore within the limits of the baselines. ("I am between the stream and the subdivision.")
  

• Real Estate appraisers use special baselines known as "comparables". A "comparables analysis" begins by choosing two or three particular pieces of property with value established by recent sale. From this baseline, the appraiser adds or subtracts changes to the value of the property being valuated. (e.g. "A third bathroom adds $6000. to the appraised value, since the baseline, or comparable property, price was based on only two.")
  

When you misplace your car keys, you use the "baseline" concept! ("I know I had them when I left the office! What have I done since then?")

If it's so obvious....

It's an obvious tool for managing: computer network configuration, paint or printing color matching, chemistry components of manufacturing processes (plating solutions, latex tanks, chemical baths, etc.), "on the money" precision machining setup, and more.

But if this is such an obvious and powerful tool, why isn't it used more effectively to improve productivity and quality in operations?

In operations audits, why do I often find:

• No two Infrastructure routers, hubs or spares configured the same way.

• Quality Assurance technicians puzzling over chemical tanks, grasping for analytical techniques that will "somehow" provide certainty about the contents. ("What do you suppose is in there?")

• Trial and error manufacturing setup. (for color matching, fixture & tool location, etc) There is sometimes an who can complete the job in a predictable amount of time, but only if you are lucky.

What's Holding You Back?

Obvious Does Not Mean Automatic. Just because a certain way of organizing information is obvious does not mean that it is automatic. There is a considerable amount of work just collecting and collating the various pieces of data required to begin to identify and establish an operations baseline.

Lack of Tools. The key benefit of a baseline & change method is the decisiveness that follows from being able to return to a known and predictable configuration or state. But there is generally a lack of familiarity with tools that allow you to describe a baseline and confirm when you have reached it.

Lack of Experience. Using a baseline is a different skill from identifying and establishing baselines. An experienced hiker who has been trained to use the baseline concept in the woods is not ready to automatically apply that experience to real estate appraisal.

Anyone can be instructed in how to use the baseline & change method in their particular field, but the expertise in establishing new uses is something that is usually only found in people who specialize. It is the specialist in operation improvement who will accrue a lifetime of experience each year using baselines to organize and simplify knowledge.