IVR systems are all about making life more efficient and easy. After all, that’s the whole purpose of technology, in my opinion. We created the IVR system to upgrade the dial-up call center and we invented the car to get from A to B in record time.

It’s all about speeding up so we have more time to relax and live our lives.

While technology made the last century the most advanced in history, it’s against our nature to look around and say, “good enough.” That’s why we replaced the call center with an IVR system. While the original model could be considered adequate, an IVR system is better, faster and easier to use.

Everything can be improved in some way, big or small.

We don’t get anywhere by just accepting what we have. We have to always ask ourselves, how can I make it better? Scientists, researchers, engineers and developers are always asking themselves this to come up with amazing new inventions and gadgets.

Sometimes, though, we mere mortals find ourselves wondering how to upgrade our world, and, for me, last weekend was one such time.

I was standing in line at airport security trying to get back home to Denver after a long weekend and, inevitably, I found myself standing behind the TSA newbie.

If you’re a frequent flyer, like myself, you know this guy.

He wears complicated lace-up boots and fifty layers of flannel jackets. He always has a chunky metal watch that he somehow forgets to remove and never takes off his belt. His pockets are bursting with metal items and sorting his liquids into a separate baggy is a completely foreign concept to his sense of travel.

You always end up wondering if this is his first time in an airport and, if not, what exactly is wrong with him.

Whenever I’m stuck behind this guy at security, which is pretty much every time I fly, I can’t help but mutter obscenities under my breath and know that there has to be a better way to do this.

…Keep reading for more in “Airport Automation”…