on Product Reliability

It is no small irony that a software application that is designed to protect IT systems from malicious actors was behind the biggest IT outage in the history of computers. A company called Crowdstrike provides a ‘Falcon Sensor’ product that is intended to scan computers that use Microsoft operating systems for vulnerabilities. And this product is deployed so deeply into its host operating systems that it has access to the ‘kernel,’ which is the program that runs the basic code that links applications to the computer hardware (like memory, central processing unit and other devices). Unfortunately a Falcon Sensor update that Crowdstrike sent to its customers had a bug that was not picked up by its own validation programs (because it too had a bug). And unfortunately, it accesses a ‘forbidden’ part of the memory that causes the infamous BSOD or ‘blue screen of death.’ So airlines, hospitals, banks, hotels and lots of other companies simply couldn’t operate.

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Many of us like to think that we can, at least sometimes, be objective. Which is the opposite of being subjective.

What does this mean? Something is ‘objective’ if it only depends on the world around it, and nothing else. Like the ‘perfect juror’ who is only swayed by facts and evidence when determining if he or she thinks someone is guilty of murder. Something is ‘subjective’ if it can be influenced … by itself. Like the ‘imperfect juror’ who decides to acquit a murder suspect regardless of the evidence … because the suspect is his or her brother. This is called bias.

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Boeing has somehow managed to make the bad public relations created by those pesky onboard batteries catching fire in 2013 practically disappear. Not through good management. But through a never-ending series of disasters and catastrophes that shows no sign of letting up which is dominating Boeing’s news cycle that there is no remaining airtime for missteps like those battery fires.

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Apple recently did something that it isn’t in the habit of doing. And that is – admitting failure. After spending $ 10 billion on ‘Project Titan’ whose aim was to produce a ‘really cool car,’ Apple decided to pull the pin and cancel it.

Simplifying Apple’s Project Titan ambitions to something as pithy as creating a ‘really cool car’ might seem a little condescending. The problem for Apple was that unfortunately, this was the practical truth. And that is why it failed.

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We like to think we make decisions based on information. We don’t. We make decisions based on emotions. And the most important emotion we rely upon for decision-making is confidence. We can be provided all the information in the world, but if we can’t understand it, trust it or believe it, we look for confidence in other ways. Often to disastrous outcomes. 

The number of ‘well-funded’ production efforts full of ‘very smart people’ that routinely generate expensive but unreliable products is sadly, very high. And it all comes down to the wrong types of confidence that well-paid decision-makers chase. 

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