Is Your Personal Technology Current?

Michael, a Denver area professor, helped to cultivate on-line education and is currently teaching classes in Cheyenne, WY remotely. Matt, a project manager in Round Rock, TX confers with his team in India via GoToMeeting. Matt has personally met his team members only once. Tim, a marketing executive in LA, stays in international contact using Skype. Jane, (get this one!) just quit her receptionist job in Boulder, CO via text messaging. Amy, works for a call center in Aurora, CO and works from home. She hasn’t been to the corporate office in months. Karen, a Broomfield, CO resident, just discovered she can save a huge amount of time by doing all her food shopping on-line. She thinks home delivery is the greatest.

What do all these people have in common? It’s technology, and they aren’t afraid to use it.

A new technology product becomes available to the public about every six weeks. In our society having a technology image is not only an important status symbol, but some careers actually require employees to keep up with technology in order to keep their job.

At what rate do we have to change to survive? Psychiatrist, William Ross Ashby, who pioneered cybernetics, established the “Law of Requisite Variety” which states, “In order to survive and thrive in a constantly changing world your personal technology or internal rate of change in terms of variability of options must equal or exceed the environmental or external rate of change.” This is a little bit of a mouthful, but important to digest.

You ask, “What does this mean to me?” This means that in order for you to survive in today’s technical environment, your personal technology has to be constantly updated, and you need to possess better technology as fast as it arrives. You have to be smart with what technology you have, and you have to be good at using it. You must constantly upgrade and acquire new stuff.

As mentioned in my previous article “The Technology Dog Ate My Homework”, I stated that as a society we’ve become dependent upon our tech toys. When compared to others, how does your technology rate? Here’s a simple assessment to start finding out.

Place an X next to the technology item you currently are using:

Laptop or netbook (less than 2 years old)
iPad
iPhone
Personal blog page
Facebook
Twitter
YouTube
Skype
Texting
Wireless Internet modem
Mobile version of Microsoft Office
External hard drive back up
Webmail
Downloadable TV or movies
Internet banking
E-readers
GPS navigation
Wii Fitness
XBox or Playstation
On-line shopping (food or clothes)

Add up the Xs and compare to the score below.

Scoring:
17-20: Geek - When it comes to technology you are the master of the universe! People come to you just for your instructional advice. However, be careful about being too arrogant. Having a technology image is important to you, so having the latest and greatest tech toys is a must. Don’t let all that power go to your head.

10-16: Nerd – You have an above average technology aptitude, and are not worried about getting through the day. You tend spend too much time on the Internet texting your friends or being on Facebook playing games. You like having new technology, but have to be careful to not alienate the people around you.

0-9: Dork – You need a technology backbone, and are obsolete. When it comes to using things like computers, you probably have other people do it for you. Since you can’t relate to the world around you, make it goal to learn a new tech toy.

Now that you have seen the list, and if you did not do well, what do you plan to do about it?

Professor KB’s Helpful Hint: In order to advance and change in today’s workplace cultures, we have to continuously learn. In business we have to find the opportunities where change and technology make an effective difference. Given our environment, virtually anything is possible. If you choose to be a leader, changing the way you see and do your work will drastically have others doing the same. You can’t just sit there – get yourself and everyone else moving!