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From... Is there a coming backlash against information technology?July 15, 1998 by Peter G. W. Keen (IDG) -- For most of this decade, information technology has been a Very Good Thing. Soon, it's going to be as popular as air pollution. IT has been a VGT for investors who got in early on tech stocks; kids who love games, surfing and chat rooms; and journalists, who have something exciting to write about. For businesses, it's been the enabler of innovation everywhere. What goes up must come down. The pendulum swings. There's a very big backlash coming against IT in general. As the visible representative of technology as a Very Good Thing, IT will be caught in the headlights of the oncoming shame-and-blame train, even though most of the backlash will reflect vendors' actions and inactions. Here are just some of the backlash generators:
The coming IT backlash will be very similar to the environmentalist attack on business that emerged in the 1980s. Then, economic growth and modernization, which had been Very Good Things, became Big Bad Business Destroying Planet Earth. Smart companies quickly accepted their responsibility to balance business and environment. IS will have to do the same. I doubt if the vendors will. They have too much invested in their strategy of "Innovate or die." IS already has a shaky reputation -- bureaucracy, cost overruns, lack of communication and all the other long-standing concerns. Year 2000 is hardly helping improve matters. It isn't enough to say that year 2000 and vendor irresponsibility aren't the fault of IS. That's like Wal-Mart saying poor-quality suppliers aren't its fault. Wal-Mart manages its suppliers on behalf of its customers. IS must do the same. I've heard several jokes recently about how "Microsoft really runs our firm." IS must take real charge. It must guarantee simplicity instead of complexity, first-rate support and after-sales service, customer safety and impeccable operations. It must anticipate the IT backlash and show that it stands for more than just the morass of technology complexity at the end of the Silicon Valley innovation chain. The IS "brand" has to be service and guarantees, not technology and best efforts. Alas, most IS shops aren't Wal-Mart. Why don't they try to be?P Keen's book, The Business Internet and Intranets, was published in February by Harvard Business School Press. He can be reached at peter@peterkeen.com.
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