You Can't Handle the Tech

[Originally published in Tech Yeah]

Trying to work in a team of 10 or more without an IT guy starts to get a bit ridiculous after a while. You don’t even need a so-called ‘Technology Stack’ before the 1 person, in this case, me gets buried in tech admin. A new staff member arriving or an old one leaving means a whole list of activities that takes up hours of my time and probably isn’t configured in the most efficient way. The truth is, we rely so much on these machines now it’s a little hard to survive without someone to wrangle it all.

So can we handle the tech?

Enter the IT Experts.

After barely 40 years of modern computing “Bam!” a whole new industry. One that, even with the latest birth of ‘the cloud’, we can’t do without. Greg Clarkson from Network Overdrive says “the IT industry has evolved rapidly and has splintered into several segments.” It’s a classic case of an industry just barely staying on its feet as new developments in areas like Artificial Intelligence or AI speed up the rate of change even more. Terms like ‘Digital Transformation’ have become common place. This is an area that attempts to educate bigger businesses on the mindset they should have to evolve their technology fast enough and continue to evolve efficiently as an organisation. “To be agile, even in a corporate environment, is key for big businesses especially when you are competing with well-funded startups” says CEO of KJR Ashley Howden. “It’s open season on technology solutions and it’s a race to utilise the cloud and everything it has to offer.”

Many businesses need a team of IT Experts now in order to keep up. “Ideally the team needs to understand all the stacks operating in a business,” says Greg Clarkson, “internal teams don’t always keep up with the rapid rate of change so they need an IT partner”.

Digital Experience

New positions in business structures have also changed in an attempt to keep up with managing all this tech. The CTO is “so last season” now, with even newer roles emerging such as CXO or Chief Experience Officer and CDO (Chief Digital Officer). Both roles incorporate ‘Experience’ and ‘Digital’ as their own dedicated areas whilst still needing to integrate with already existing C suite roles. Technology Architects can be found hiding around every corner as well, to not only fix existing systems but create new ones where necessary. Systems Architects grace our workplaces too.

So what about the humans in all of this? Founder of Human Hackers, Phil Richards explains, “It’s important that we don’t lose sight of the fact that from an experience point of view the human beats technology hands down. It is our minds that determine the feeling & value associated with an experience, not the technology. The danger is the overwhelming power of technology to condition us”. Wise words, especially with worldwide revenues from cognitive systems and AI estimated to go from nearly $8 billion in 2016 to more than $47 billion in 2020, according to IDC.

So where does all this technology lead us? Hopefully to a better place, but in the meantime, keep your head about you, take a deep breath, and try and keep up.

Ian Hopkinson is the original “mad scientist” – a digital creative who is passionate about the online market place and its potential to enable businesses to compete on a global stage. He is the Founder & Head of Results at Mad Scientist Digital. "You Can't Handle the Tech" was originally published in Tech Yeah.