Computer Efficiency

I've been meaning to write this blog for a long time...so long that I've actually lost the article I wanted to quote from.

When I flew back to Vietnam from Japan, I was given a free copy of the English version of Vietnam News on my Vietnam Air flight. There was an article in the newspaper that really made me laugh and simultaneously shake my head and say, "ah, Vietnam." The article was about computer efficiency in the government. I'm going to completely make up two statistics here but I promise you that they are not far off from the stats that I read. The article said that:

Ridiculous statistic recalled from my memory #1: Up to 35% of government office workers are now using computers.

Ridiculous statistic recalled from my memory #2: 80% of those using computers have reported that their jobs are more efficient.

I recently had to go to a government office and indeed there were no computers. Everyone was using pens and papers and searching for things in filing cabinets. Yes, filing cabinets. Sure, people in the Western World still use filing cabinets but 99% of everything we "file" is online these days. I can assure you after having stood around for twenty minutes as they searched for a piece of paper with my name on it, computers are more efficient. I'm not sure what the other 20% of the people from my recalled stats were thinking.