IEC’s pioneering electronic effort nearing completion

In 2004, the International Electrotechnical Commission plans to finalize its 100% “electronic only” environment for technical and administrative work. At present it is almost complete; the final task of giving National Committees the ability to vote electronically on IEC Council decisions is scheduled to be finished during the first half of 2004.

The IEC’s electronic voting system for technical documents has been in operation for nearly six years. It provides security to the IEC’s National Committees and can be used with all current Internet technology. Extending this facility to Council documents closes the final link in the chain, rendering electronic the entire standards development process and administration of the IEC. Document distribution, commenting and voting on documents, vote tabulation and announcement of the voting result are all fully electronic processes.

Much was made in the 1990s of the “paperless office”. That term is less popular today because paper still plays a big role in our working lives and is likely to continue to do so for the foreseeable future. But the term and its various homonyms potentially carry multiple meanings. The IEC’s electronic working environment can be divided into two broad categories: documents in electronic format and electronic voting. The two operate together, but are distinct. Having access to documents in electronic format means accessing things like PDF or Word or Excel files via the Internet or by email or from an ftp site or a CD-Rom, and so forth. Electronic voting means entering comments and votes via the browser directly into a database.

At the IEC, distribution of, access to and commenting on documents in electronic format and electronic voting started as long ago as 1998. “We were pioneers in this in Geneva,” says IEC General Secretary Aharon Amit, “although it should hardly be surprising that the International Electrotechnical Commission – and I stress the “electro” in Electrotechnical – began to work so early in an electronic-only environment. I’m encouraged to see that others are following our lead towards greater efficiency in international standardization. We’ve cut 44 months out of the average development time for IEC standards and making the best use of electronic means has a lot to do with that.”

A big step was taken towards an “electronic only” environment when in 2001 the IEC made it mandatory that all comments and voting on technical work be done by electronic means only. This meant the IEC would no longer accept comments and votes sent in by mail or by fax.

People still have to come up with ideas, think about them and decide at various stages whether to go forward or not with any given project. The advantage that electronics brings is that the IEC’s global reach is instantaneous and that people can spend time thinking about the issues rather than administering them. It also means a very significant reduction in costs associated with printing documents and mailing them around the world.