Nicholas Carr provocatively once asked, “Does IT matter?” and riled up a whole bunch of people. Once he argued that technology really didn’t offer a business any long term competitive advantage, just table stakes, basically, so big investments of time and money into it didn’t make sense especially for non-technology companies. I don’t think he believes that in a black and white way any longer. On the contrary, those companies who invested in R&D and technology seem to keep a competitive advantage. In fact, technology - the strategy, the architecture, enables what’s possible for the business, whole product line, and enterprise operations, and inventive people are the biggest asset.But things do change constantly. Look in your rearview mirror and you see all the roadkill of every hot, sexy ‘can’t lose’ technology. All that’s left is the product swag sitting on someone’s desk like a ragged toy from the past. Most everything and every skill that was very valuable a just a few years ago is not where things are headed now. Most of the work in technology can seem like creating a Tibetan sand painting. People spend hours of deep technical devotion to the creation of it, then it’s wiped clean and we start again. In the town I live in, they have an annual chalk art festival on the concrete and tar downtown. After hours of work by artists, a rainshower will wash it away quickly or it will slowly fade in the sunlight. The chalk art attached to this post is “Picasso’s Rooster,” and it was meticulously and beautifully created. But it doesn’t last. Except as a digital copy…I’d argue that working in technology is a lot like creating a Tibetan sand painting. Make your peace with that and get on with moving forward in the current wave of life.
Some fundamentals still remain. The future rushes forward always, and advantage is always shifting and relative. People engage in the joy of work and invention, enjoying the fruits of the day. And there’s always the striving and strategy to surf the waves successfully. It is necessary to keep inventing and adjusting to meet the world. The strategies people use can be both beautiful and fascinating.
