Problem 3 — Sociotechnical redesign for safety-critical work (20 pts) A hospital unit uses a digital checklist app for medication administration. Nurses report alarm fatigue and frequent checklist overrides. Design a redesign that reduces overrides by 50% while preserving urgent alerting. Your answer should: a) Outline the redesign changes (UI, process, training, and governance). (8 pts) b) Explain how you would measure success (3 primary metrics and target values). (6 pts) c) Identify two potential negative side effects and mitigation plans. (6 pts) Section D — Case analysis and essay (40 points) Choose one of the two case prompts below and write a structured analysis (≈800–1000 words). Use headings for Problem, Stakeholders, Constraints, Options (with 3 alternatives evaluated), Recommendation (single clear choice), Implementation plan (6–9 actionable steps), and Risk mitigation.
Case 2 — Knowledge worker burnout in a research group A university research lab reports rising burnout among postdocs: long hours, fragmented attention, and unclear authorship credit. The PI has limited funds for hiring. Propose a sociotechnical intervention suite that reduces burnout indicators by 25% in 6 months, preserves research output, and clarifies credit allocation.
Case 1 — Gig-platform onboarding A food-delivery platform faces high onboarding drop-off: many applicants sign up but few complete vehicle inspection and start delivering. The platform currently offers automated digital guides, a 1-hour mandatory online safety module, and optional in-person inspection centers with long wait times. Analyze root causes and redesign onboarding to increase completed onboardings by 30% within 3 months while controlling cost per onboard.
Problem 2 — Incentive design and unintended consequences (20 pts) A company introduces a KPI: “tickets closed per day” to motivate customer support agents. After rollout, closures increase but customer satisfaction drops. Using course frameworks, do the following: a) Map the causal chain from KPI change to decreased satisfaction (diagram + brief labels). (8 pts) b) Propose a revised KPI system with three metrics that balance speed, quality, and learning; justify each. (8 pts) c) Describe an A/B test to validate the new system over 8 weeks (sample sizes, primary outcome, and stopping criteria). (4 pts)
Problem 1 — Workflow latency analysis (20 pts) A distributed team performs a five-step editorial workflow (steps A→B→C→D→E). Expected processing times (minutes per item) when handled by humans are: A=12, B=8, C=20, D=10, E=5. The probability an item requires a rework loop back from D to B is 0.15; that rework requires B and C again. Items arrive in bursts — average arrival rate 6 items/hour during peak 2-hour windows. The team has one specialist per step. a) Compute the expected processing time per item including rework. (10 pts) b) Identify the bottleneck and compute its utilization at peak. (6 pts) c) Recommend two redesign choices (e.g., staffing, automation, batching) to reduce average cycle time, and estimate the expected reduction in minutes for each choice (assume linear scaling). (4 pts)