Six Aims

Socially constructed systems and processes can be assessed along each of these dimensions.

Ethical

The tools and methods for designing these dimensions are different.

Safety is a matter of preventing things from happening. Best tools: Tripod Beta, Resilience Engineering, etc.

Effectiveness requires clarity about purposes and stakeholders and benefits from Idealized Design—a way to start fresh, unbound by the path dependency of the current processes and systems.

Efficiency and Timeliness are related. Best tools Value Stream mapping and A3 Problem Solving, Statistical Process Control.

Ethical systems and processes must integrate all of the Six Aims: Safe, Equitable, Effective, Efficient, Timely, and Customer-centered.

Customer-Centered systems and processes, Equitable and Ethical systems and processes all require: designing with the customer, transparency, accountability, protection from tampering and corruption. Societal norms, laws, agreements, customs all come into play.

There may be a relative hierarchy among these system attributes: Equitable (fair), Customer-centered, Safety (first do no harm), Effective (accomplishes it purpose), Timely (occurs before it is too late), Efficient.