One challenge in designing enterprise systems is how to think about the deletion of records.  I discussed the issue with Jay yesterday, and he had several suggestions.

First, to prevent fraud, sabotage and accidents, the ability to delete records should restricted to a very small group of senior personnel or forbidden entirely.  When a person attempts to delete a record, the system should required approval from another person.

Second, the system must be designed to cleanse itself of unneeded records that contain potentially damaging confidential information.  These situations occur frequently in service industries where companies handle confidential information belonging to their customers.  For example, a bank or health insurance firm handles personal information about customers, and a management consulting firm handles confidential information belonging to client companies.  Such information must be destroyed when it is no longer needed.

The system should function much like a blind sweeper that cleans conference rooms after meetings end and the participants have left.  The sweeper cannot access the content of any forgotten or abandoned papers, so he simply burns them all.  Such a system must keep track of who needs the information.  Each of these people can be thought of as a person in the conference room.  Only when all the people have left can the blind sweeper enter and destroy the information in the room.  To ensure consistency, destruction of information should occur in two phases.  First, the information to be destroyed is isolated.  Then, when all information to be destroyed has been accounted for, the destruction should take place.

The blind sweeper approach is similar to garbage collection in software, where references to a piece of information lock it in place.  When there are no references to a piece of information, the system deletes it.

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そしてトヨタ自動車の豊田社長がテレビインタビューで下記のように使ったそうです。

「豊田社長は雇用を守ることについて、今は石にかじりついても守ると言っているがそうならなくなる状況もあると話した。大企業こそが中小企業の発注者なのを理解して欲しいと話した。豊田社長は公益資本主義の土俵の中で成長をしている限りは応援してもらえると話し、成長し続けたいと話した。」（リンク）

講演の場のご提供、講演録の転載へのご協力、交詢社の皆様に厚く御礼申し上げます。

【アップデート】東北大地震における分析を加えたらどうか、と日本の友達からコメントを頂きました。改訂版はこちらからダウンロードできます。

UPDATE: My friends in Japan suggested that I add my perspective on the Tohoku disaster.  Here’s an updated version with a discussion of the disaster from a Public Interest Capitalism perspective.

A new study – co-authored by Stanford researcher Mark Z. Jacobson and UC-Davis researcher Mark A. Delucchi – analyzing what is needed to convert the world’s energy supplies to clean and sustainable sources says that it can be done with today’s technology at costs roughly comparable to conventional energy. But converting will be a massive undertaking on the scale of the moon landings. What is needed most is the societal and political will to make it happen.

詳細はこちら