Technology Providers: are we afraid of our past? 

As technology leaders, I think it is incumbent upon us to have our organizations and customers occasionally look back and measure the promises we, as technology providers, made and measure the results our technology delivered to truly review the impact of our solutions. Often I wonder if technology ever gets its just do or is it just thrown in with other technology we take for granted like fire. Nostalgia has its place, but in reality one application does not define a process or impact on an organization. Embracing a technology today makes it possible to more easily keep up with the changes to technology and respond as well as plan for future changes.

When measuring the impact of technology is it enough to measure just current results? Is it possible the real impact of technology is the next step we are preparing for and opening us up to new possibilities and laying the foundation to accept the next technological step? Harder to measure, yes, but it is no less important then a measure of ROI.

The term “technology” conjures up as many thoughts and images as there are people.

The Wikipedia® definition of technology is “a broad concept that deals with a species’ usage and knowledge of tools and crafts, and how it affects a species’ ability to control and adapt to its environment. In human society, it is a consequence of science and engineering, although several technological advances predate the two concepts.”

However, a strict definition is elusive; “technology” can refer to material objects of use to humanity, such as machines, hardware or utensils, but can also encompass broader themes, including systems, methods of organization and techniques. The term can either be applied generally or to specific areas: examples include “construction technology,” “medical technology,” or “state-of-the-art technology.”

I submit that technology boils down to making our lives easier. More importantly, technology should make our lives easier without thinking about how it is making our lives easier. However, there, is a downside for technology providers if users are not thinking about how technology is improving our lives or “controlling our environment.”  The downside is that buyers of technology quickly forget their lives have been improved, how they have been and by whom.

When technology is not seen, heard or thought of it is operating exactly the way it should be. If we accept the Wikipedia definition, that what we do is about controlling our environment, the best environment is doing what you want to do, when you want to without thought of any “hunting or gathering.”

Do technology leaders find their organizations do not want to look back and may keep their clients from looking back? Is there some hesitation to point out that way back when the move to IBM® PCs with 5 ¼” DOS disks was a good thing because those PCs (like all things we buy) eventually aged and needed to be replaced? Aging necessitated new PCs and that grew into new and more powerful applications. Therefore the LOTUS® 123 that we introduced to increase productivity is almost laughably old now, but it was a vital cog moving business into a world of productivity. That application led to newer and better applications.

The impact is in more than just the ROI for a process or on equipment. The impact also needs to include the way an organization is prepared for the future.

In the insurance world where I come from, not too long ago typewriters were used over PCs. On a straight cost argument, buying a computer over a typewriter is a bad idea. We did some time studies in an area where we provide applications. On a straight cost argument, the typewriter, the typist and the team keeping them busy easily beats a PC and an application.

• The PCs needed 10 times the efficiencies in production over a typewriter to pay back the technology investment.

When buying PCs, companies ended up trading a typist’s salary for an IT expert’s salary. They traded a low cost to buy and maintain a (literal) machine for a much more complicated and temperamental machine. A straight bean-counting argument could never have justified the move from a typewriter-based workflow to the PC-based workflow.

• What justified the move was also measuring the use of the information, future use of information, recovery of information and passing along information the PCs enabled.

Data mining, field entry, speed, support, inter-connectivity will shift the cost model to a win for the technology side. That leap allowed an organization to think beyond process management to proactive management.

Along the way, though, missteps and bad technology decision making can lead to technology being an anchor that becomes a mirage of great expectations but a nightmare in reality. The wrong technology choices can have you working for it as opposed to it working for you. At that moment, technology is not making your life easier and is not functioning without a second thought.

Without sounding like a snake-oil salesperson, a purchasing mistake with technology can be exactly what an organization needed. A review of the decision that led to a “poor” decision process can certainly benefit any organization, but in reality is it that “poor” process that leads to looking not only to today, but how it positions a company for the future? 

We ensure that our clients can and do gain tangible and comparable returns on their technology investments of today and also how our process can lead to better applications and actions in the future. Sure, more than ever, companies need the right technology to access, transfer and mine data more quickly and cheaply. However, getting a company into a position of thinking about data instead of applications, end process instead of through process, a “failing” or “failed” technology may be the best “bad” event to hit a company.  

On some level an application we sold to a customer may have fallen short of expectations, but that is not reason not to look back. Making that first decision should be celebrated for allowing the next decision and the following decisions to be made.

As with my retired friends, thinking of the good old days may not be the best way to evaluate technology and its impact. If you go back 15 years to the point in time when an organization I dealt with moved from a green screen and typewriter environment to a desktop LAN and WAN environment, it was a painful, “costly” process if measured by the metrics then. Today, that organization has forgotten about the recriminations, the second-guessing and ladder climbing reshuffle. I know the technology providers of the time were painted with a broad brush of incompetent, snake-oil salespeople. That decision and those people are exactly why that organization is a high-performing group today. There should not be an instant of hesitation to look back by the company or by the technology providers. In fact, it should almost be mandatory.

Asking that technology provider to ask that organization to look back could cause spasms and gasps. However, both organizations would benefit greatly from looking back. They in effect are reminding those retirees pining for simpler times in those e-mails, they benefit from that technology they are using without thinking of it. It is not a past to run from; it is a past and results that need to be embraced and pulled into the metrics of measuring any of today’s’ technology decisions. Now where is that roll of stamps?

About e2Value, Inc.

e2Value®, Inc. is a full-service application development, insurance consulting, strategic technology partner and provider, offering products to assist with Insurance-To-Value (ITV) and workflow solutions. Founded in 1999 by former insurance executives and based in Stamford, CT, e2Value is the leading hosted application provider delivering replacement cost valuations over the web for all residential, commercial and farm and ranch properties in the United States.

The firm offers full-featured, knowledge-based Internet applications that enable consistency and standardization of pricing, processes and procedures for insurance, real estate and banking professionals. e2Value provides a tool that tracks through the entire sales to valuation to final claim process via an application that maximizes the latest available technology, and provides quick and easy updates without a significant investment in software or infrastructure. Its clients range from the world’s leading insurance companies to one-person insurance agencies, as well as banks, property appraisers and risk managers.

The founders of e2Value, Todd Rissel, Chairman and CEO and George Moore, President and CTO, have career backgrounds in the insurance and construction industries. Their combined experiences and perspectives have helped them to build a valuation system that is unrivaled for accuracy, flexibility of application and revenue generation for its users.

For information visit www.e2value.com, or contact sales@e2value.com or 888-371-2788.