Pick one that looks like you

I've mentioned before in the context of things going publicly wrong the importance of following procedure, and the difficulties that arise when trying to persuade people (in general, but unskilled workers in particular) of the importance of following procedure even in the face of compelling forces operating in directions opposite to those recommended.

I was reminded of this today on hearing a news bulletin about the issue of security passes to airport workers in the US. Following 9-11 security procedures were drastically tightened and steps put in place to perform detailed background checks on anyone applying to work in areas where the safety and security of airline passengers could be compromised. You might ask why such procedures were not in place before 9-11, but (a) I don't have an answer to that and (b) if I did it would probably be too long to type in here, so I'll concentrate on the topic at hand.

The trouble is, these procedures are designed by people who have never run an airport, or tried to recruit anyone, or even tried to follow the procedures they themselves have written. When you're a low-paid supervisor, and your manager asks you why the shift hasn't been filled, it won't cut any ice to say "because I'm waiting for the background checks to be done on these five candidates."

So I wasn't surprised (although more than a little disturbed) to hear that new recruits to the ground staff at Chicago's O'Hare airport are shown a box full of old security passes belonging to previous employees and told "pick one that looks like you."