In our team workshop last week I shared some technology beliefs, principles or statements (don't know what to call it).
They help me approach (digital) technology in this uncertain, complex and fast-moving world.
All technologies serve a purpose. Sometimes it's obvious, sometimes you must dig deeper to discover it and it can also change over time. Find and understand the purpose.
Technologies cause new problems for every problem they solve. The problems of today are caused by yesterday's successes, and the technical solutions today will cause the problems of tomorrow.
All technologies are combinations of existing technologies. Look for surprising innovations and benefits in the combination and remix of different technologies.
All technologies come from social interactions and exchange of ideas. Not the lone genius. Go out and observe and talk with different people.
Technologies thrive in ecosystems of highly interdependent technologies that support each other. The success of one technology often depends on the success of others in a mix of collaboration and competition. You see this with all the partnerships and collaborations being established by tech companies. They compete in one dimension, but collaborate in another because their technologies benefit each other.
The more powerful a technology is, the more powerfully it will be abused. Unfortunately, new technologies will also unleash new ways to lie, cheat, steal, spy, and terrorize.
We tend to fit all new technologies into the old frame we already know. It's just harder to imagine how the known and comfortable frame can and should change to exploit the benefits from new technologies.
Nothing is as easy as it looks like. Period.
Technology in the future will be a series of endless upgrades. Nothing is finished. Nothing is done.
No matter how it looks first, it is always a people* problem (* = process, people, organization). Yep, usually the things that make or break technologies are process, organization and people challenges.
Successful technologies are the ones we only notice when they don’t work. They have become invisible. We don't even call them technologies anymore. Just look around you in the room you are sitting in now.
The coolest and most disruptive technologies of all have not been invented yet.
What do you think?
