Technology for Leaders, Business and Organization

Technology for Leaders, Business and Organization

Introduction

In the future, when customers enter your company, an eye-scan automatically identify profile of the customers in a flash light. From their gender, ages, interests, income, health, daily spending, shopping or wish list to their criminal history for security check. The holographic advertising, which is the most corresponded to their profile, is popping up instantly on the side way while the customers walking by. When the customers reach an information desk, at that time, the receptionist or operator has already received their information from their computer. These pictures are similar to many scenes in the sci-fi movies such as in "Minority report". From that illustration, the most important part of those scenes is information. Information is a power and substantial significance components for the company's competitive advantage. By integrating an advanced technology with an outstanding information management, company will step out gracefully into the global business arena.

The Impact of IT to Business and Corporate

 What is IT?

In today's competitive business environment, everything can happen in the internet world or cyberspace. Information technology plays an important role in global corporations and now permeates every aspect of a business. Information Technology (IT) is defined as the development, installation, and implementation of computer systems and applications (the American Heritage Dictionary of English Language, 2000). IT that is the most appropriate for organizations is not the most cutting edge technology in the market, but the technology that fits the organization's information behavior and culture is the most practical one.

 Type of Technology that we can adopt

In most cases, IT that commonly adopts in the companies is regarding networking and telecommunications which use for information sharing, connecting and structuring. Such as the internet, Voice Over Internet Protocol (VOIP), and e-mail.

Needles to say that new technologies come out everyday; the latest technology to adopt at the organization is not the issue anymore. The significance issue is how to employ and manage the proper technology and the proper system to people in organization.

Managing IT for Competitive Advantage

Managing the IT Business Value:

Human-Centered Approach

In this perspective, the IT specialists suppose to provide the technology that will serve as a catalyst for change. Also shared databases will allow employees to interact with other departments effectively. Many times IT managers emphasize too much on hardware and stress too little on the soft science of how people actually sharing information. Indeed, IT managers need to take a human-approach for implementing IT in the organization. This approach directly addresses how to rebuild an organization's information culture and how to get beyond the technologies to changing organizational behaviors.

In many cases, companies that adopt the latest management information systems or groupware normally spend little time training employees to use them efficiently. IT managers should change their paradigm. They must begin by thinking about how people use information, instead of how people use that technology. A human- center approach assumes that information is complex, ever-expanding, and impossible to control completely.

Human-Centered IT Managers Focus on How People Use Information Rather than Machines

Information architectures: Human-centered approaches:

Focus on computerized data Focus on broad information types

Emphasize information provision Emphasize information use and sharing

Assume permanence of solutions Assume transience of solutions

Assume single meaning of terms Assume multiple meanings of terms

Stop when design is done or when system Continue until desired behavior is achieved

is built enterprisewide

Build enterprisewide structures Build point-specific structures

Assume compliance with policies Assume compliance is gained over time through influence

Source: Saving IT's Soul: Human-Centered Information Management, Thomas H. Davenport. Harvard Business Review on the business value of IT. Boston, MA: Harvard Business School Press, c1999.

Multiple Meanings

No matter how simple or basic a unit of information may seem, there can be valid disagreement about its meaning. Since people have their own perspective of things, the different definitions on the same word can be possible. These multiple meanings create confusion in workplaces and make the job of information management treacherous at best. Since the same term, like "customers", has a particular definition for each division, searching the same term on the same database will get a different result. Consequently, even the most fundamental information is difficult to share among staffs. Management will not rely on the information they receive to make a decision. The whole organization is vulnerable in productivity and trust. Leader has to come up with an effective and decisive solution to deal with this type of problem such as, making a clear definition for the confusing word and standardize it all over the organization.

In other cases, the multiple meanings should not be eliminated, especially large corporations with diverse businesses. There will always be a healthy tension between information globalism, which attempts to develop universal meanings that apply to an entire organization, and information particularism, which individuals and small groups define information in ways that match their commonsense. In this circumstance, regional managers or top executives in those companies may have a hard work interpreting the information from each branch or subsidiary to correspond with the parent company information streams. Though dual information streams are disorganized and difficult to control, it is worth information interpreting to make a work flow flows well and enhance productivity for an entire organization.

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