Every morning I scan through my personal river of information so I can grab the pieces that might be helpful to me, or to my clients. As I looked today, I reviewed the Google site Demoslam which pits software applications against one another. Then I read the last few blogs from TechCrunch, which listed the normal twenty or so new sites from around the world that they feel merited press. And of course I read through another handful of announcements on applications from other random sources. Then I stopped for a moment because one has to be amazed at the sheer volume of online applications that are being offered to the public at this point. I guess we live at the confluence of technology tools that make it easy to write applications, and the Internet giving us the delivery vehicle for them. Add to that a few developers that have made billions from hitting the magic mixture of interface and capability, and you have the current explosion of apps.
“New technology is common, new thinking is rare.”
‐ Sir Peter Blake
Hence the quote from Sir Peter Blake… New technology is becoming common. Finding new ways to apply it is much more rare. There seems to be a lesson here for leaders because technology continues to be more important every day to an organizations success. It does not matter what your industry might be, technology can give you an edge on the competition. At the same time, technology is not the single magic bullet. You still have to perform your basic industry tasks with aplomb. The thing is, there are always creative ways to reach into the new grab bags of technology tools raining down on us and figure out how to use something. Unless… you suffer from being overwhelmed and have just given up.
That is the real issue, is it not? The explosion of technology tools dropping on the world is creating a situation where many leaders (and people in general) are just giving up. We pick out a few new things that fly by us (iPad’s, Foursquare, or Windows 7 for example) and let the rest fall on the floor. There just is not time in the day to stay up on every new thing announced. Believe me, I get it. I have to live in this tech world and give advice to people, so I have to study it for a living! Time was I prided myself on the fact that whenever I did Q&A I could answer any question about a new application because I knew something about all of them. Today, people asking me what I think if this one or that, regularly stump me. Sad really…
The problem with giving up is that using the best technology tools for the situation really does make a difference. Opting out of doing research and development in the online application space means that you are opting out of improving your business processes. Therefore, opting out for too long means you will be at a big disadvantage in the market. That means you personally, or the organizations you work for. Like it or not, we must find ways to stay up on the most current tools being offered. My solution to this is that everyone must invest a little time each week in technology tool R&D. Even if this is just 30 minutes a week, it must be done. For organizations, there must be a formal process in place with someone that owns the responsibility for this same type of R&D.
Companies that build powerful and effective R&D processes now, will win tomorrow. This must be formalized, it must be measured, and it will be a differentiator as time goes on.