Technology's Greatest Achievement
The Potential to Be Great
In the past 40 years, corporate technology has evolved at an astonishing rate, completely transforming how we live and work.
Just a generation ago, my father managed four large bank branches with nothing more than a desk phone, an oversized glass ashtray, an ink blotter, and a pen. His office desk was bigger than our kitchen table.
Back then, when I was in primary school, bank employees manually calculated daily interest on every account using old-fashioned loan and interest tables1.
Today, I can build and run a digital bank from my phone. The possibilities seem endless.
Despite these advancements, it’s easy to get swept up in the latest technologies and lose sight of the real driver of progress: vision. Without a clear vision of where we are headed and what we want to change, what have we actually achieved?
Many industries haven’t matched the transformative pace of the financial sector, which has leveraged technology to drive real progress. Instead, they’ve become stuck in a loop of constant tech adoption, mistaking it for advancement.
Rather than enabling true growth or innovation, the tools meant to support them have created a cycle of dependency, leaving them trapped, not empowered, by technology.
Technology isn’t inherently problematic; rather, issues arise when new tools are adopted without a clear, purposeful strategy. Without a defined direction, technology shifts from being a means to solve problems to becoming a burden—an aimless solution that ultimately creates more challenges than it resolves.
Poor technology decisions, and ultimately ineffective operational environments that frustrate both staff and customers, often arise from a lack of a well-defined strategic vision.
Without a clear sense of direction, organisations end up making reactive choices that don’t align with their real objectives. This isn’t a failure of the technology itself but a failure in taking ownership of strategic decision-making.
Breaking out of this cycle is challenging because too many have lost the ability to dream boldly and, even harder still, the conviction to make those dreams a reality. True progress requires both a clear vision of what’s possible and the resolve to follow through.
Real strategy goes beyond understanding what the business is currently doing; it requires knowing why—and aligning technology choices with a larger, long-term vision instead of just chasing the latest trends.
When used with purpose, technology can be transformative. But without clarity of goals, organisations will always fall back on familiar patterns, repeating what they’ve always done.
Leading organisational theorists Lee Bolman and Terrence Deal captured this beautifully decades ago when they said, “When we don’t know what to do, we do more of what we know”. [mic drop]
Today, every business has the tools, platforms, and capabilities to revolutionise how they operate. Yet many hesitate. Unsure of how to harness this potential. Reluctant to take a new path. Unwilling to invest the necessary resources and time.
The future belongs to those who can clearly define their vision and make purposeful technology investments to achieve it.
The greatest achievement of technology over the last few decades is simply the potential to be great.
Ultimately, the greatest promise of technology lies in its ability to bring people together in the pursuit of noble goals.
For those with clarity of purpose, it is a means to achieving the difficult or just down-right impossible. Its true strength and power is to unite us, not divide us, in pursuit of something greater.
Therefore I think the biggest IT challenge we really face today is not technological. It is existential. It is to relearn how to dream.
To harness this potential, we must first pick a point in the distance. One that is sufficiently difficult to reach. Where the journey to get there will be filled with obstacles. But one that when we get there, it will be others that celebrate the meaningful change.
What’s your dream?
I still have my dad's old copy of Archer’s Loan Repayments and Compound Interest Tables, 8th Edition. It’s more than just a red hardback book—it represents what the first banking mainframe computers were built to replace.