Tasks

The word task is used in many different ways by different people. Some people treat tasks as basic activities. Some treat them as an assignment simply has to undertake. Some people speak of task in terms of the behaviour that people undoubtedly have to apply in order to do useful things.

Because there are different uses of the word task, there are different approaches to task analysis that have always been difficult to reconcile. Trying to reconcile these is futile. So, instead, for the sake of this website a task will be considered to be a requirement to achieve a goal or goals in a particular work context, according to particular standards and in accordance with particular resource constraints.

This is very fuzzy but has certain things in its favour.

• It enables focus on purpose — and purpose will be provided by whoever is responsible for the task getting done.
• It provides constraints — as encountered in all real-world tasks – against which performance of the task will need to be measured.
• And it incorporates resources which can be used, as appropriate, to find ways to get the job done.

In these respects, it captures the practical considerations of the world and the challenge in managing things get done effectively.

But this interpretation of ‘task’ just sets the context of an investigation methods. To provide a more rigourous way of looking at tasks, HTA focuses on the idea of the operation. An operation is the process of doing something that is appropriate to enable the task to be completed.