Christopher Monnier

The recent changes in policy at the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) indicate that the TSA is failing as an organization.  They are failing not because terrorist attacks have gone un-prevented (they haven’t), but rather because the users they serve are receiving an experience that does not meet their needs.  The root of this failure lies in a fundamental misunderstanding of who the TSA’s users are and what their needs are.  In other words, the TSA is a design failure.

First, I think it’s important to highlight who the TSA’s users are.  In a broad sense, there are two groups of users who “experience” the effects of airport security: (1) the people inside the plane and (2) everybody else on the ground.  These two different user groups have very different sets of needs when it comes to air travel.  People in user group #1 need a variety of things (easy check-in, friendly luggage policies, legroom, etc.), while people in user group #2 need really only one thing—not to be involved in a crash when an airplane hits the ground or a building on the ground.

The needs of the people in user group #2 have already been met.  Whether intentional or not, one of the earliest security measures instituted after September 11th was targeted at meeting the needs of people in user group #2.  With reinforced cockpit doors—a relatively lo-fi and simple fix—it became practically impossible for an airplane passenger to hijack a plane and turn it into a weapon of mass destruction.  The need for people on the ground to not die from an airplane being flown into the ground or a building has been met.  For user group #2, the problem has been solved.

Therefore, the efforts of the TSA should be focused exclusively on meeting the needs of user group #1. The needs of the people in this group—air travelers—are myriad and include everything from the moment a person books a flight on the Internet to the moment they leave their destination airport.  We can think of this list of needs as feeding into the “customer experience supply chain.”

A quick diversion about the notion of the customer experience supply chain.  Originating in the design community, thinking of experiences in this way (explained at length in design legend Bob Brunner’s book Do You Matter) helps ensure that, throughout all of its various customer touchpoints, a system meets the needs of its users.  Consider the example of a fast food drivethru system, in which the experience chain begins when the user drives into the parking lot and ends when the user finishes her food.  An important component of a fast food drivethru system is ensuring that the customer receives the correct food.  One way this could be addressed would be by having the employee at the pickup window—a key touchpoint in the system—remove all of the food items from the bag and show, in detail, each item to the customer.  Remove the hamburger from the bag, unwrap it, remove the top bun to show the contents of the hamburger, maybe lift up the patty to prove to the customer that the onions are indeed present…you get the picture.

That’s not how fast food drivethrus work, because having employees dissect customers’ food in front of them is a solution that is disproportionate to the importance of that particular touchpoint.  Customers would rather take their chances—which they probably know are pretty good—and just grab the bag of food and drive away.  Yes, it’s important that customers get the right food, but in terms of the drivethru experience it’s not important enough to justify a dissection of the customer’s food.  It is not worth ruining the enjoyability of the fast food drivethru experience for potentially preventing the occasional customer from receiving the wrong food.

Now, back to air travel.  There are dozens of touchpoints in the customer experience supply chain, many related to how enjoyable a flight is, many related to how safe a flight is, and some related to both.  The security experience affects both enjoyability and safety, but even if we limit the scope of touchpoints to those which affect safety (the drive to the airport, security, eating at the airport, the actual plane ride, and the drive away from the airport), we see that security is but one piece of the air travel experience chain.  Add in all the other touchpoints that affect enjoyability (namely the process of purchasing the ticket, sitting on the plane, watching a movie, picking up luggage, etc.), and the overall importance of airport security on the customer experience is further lessened.

Now, obviously the stakes are higher when it comes to airport security than when fulfilling a fast food order.  But just as verifying a customer’s order must live within the fast food drivethru ecosystem, so must security live within the air travel ecosystem.  And air travel is inherently risky: you could die in a car crash on the way to the airport, you could die at the airport itself (e.g. from choking on some food), you could die due to a mechanical or system error on the plane, and you could die when driving away from your destination airport.  Moreover, the alternative to flying—driving—is even riskier, but that’s a topic for another blog post.

It is within the context of the risks listed above that the relative risk of dying from a terrorist attack must be placed, and in turn the importance of the airport security process determined.  Air travelers have, by definition, already accepted some level of risk, and unless terrorism dramatically amplifies that risk (which it doesn’t), there’s no reason for the security process to outweigh its respective importance in the experience chain*.  Just as the fast food order inspection process should not dominate the fast food drivethru experience, the airport security process should not dominate the air travel experience.

The airport security process should be designed within the context of the entire air travel customer experience supply chain, with the ultimate goal being to optimize both the safety and enjoyability of air travelers.  Against these metrics, the TSA’s recent “scan or grope” policy is an utter failure.

* Granted, at certain times (i.e. for a month following a terrorist attack somewhere in the world), the fear of a terrorist attack may be of greater concern than other factors, and as such the security process should be augmented slightly to account for the increased level of perceived importance among users, perhaps even some through some level of security theater.