Efficiency-Thoroughness Trade-Off

Hollnagel. E. (2009) The ETTO Principle, Efficiency-Thoroughness Trade-Off. Ashgate Imprint Aldershot. 

Complex Adaptive Systems (CAS) is frequently used as a label for the tightly coupled, non-linear systems that Charles Perrow described in his book. Normal Accidents. While it is indisputable that many of the systems we have built truly are complex, multifaceted, self-organising and adaptive, the CAS term is frequently used as a convenient label that apparently solves a multitude of scientific problems but which in reality is just another efficiency-thoroughness trade-off. This is clearly recognised by the following quotation ... 

Efficiency-thoroughness trade-off The efficiency-thoroughness trade-off (ETTO) describes the fact that people (and organisations) as part of their activities practically always makes a trade-off between the resources (time and effort) they spend on preparing... 

HoUnagel E (2009) The ETTO principle. Efficiency-thoroughness trade-off Ashgate Publishing, Famham... 

Trade-offs Involving the Efficiency, Thoroughness, and Selectivity of the Search... 

This simplified FRAM representation allows us to reason about the propagation of variability. For example, the provision of the clearance could vary in terms of its timing aspect, i.e. it could be provided late (for instance according to complex conflicts in the sector). In this case, there is less than adequate time available to execute the clearance. In such a situation, there may be a trade-off between efficiency and thoroughness in such a way that the weather check may be omitted (i.e. the precondition between execute clearance and check weather conditions) in order to save time. 

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