Here is a statement most people do not argue with these days – we simply could not run our organizations without the aid of technology. While it is awesome we now have a huge inventory of technology to assemble solutions with, most executives have gone wrong by thinking building technology or writing software is like engineering, or ditch digging: a very mechanical process performed by geeks with no social skills. The reality is, the process of building IT is completely artistic.
The proof of this is, technology tools are so flexible they allow a developer to assemble the pieces in thousands of different ways and still get the same result. An analogy would be asking 100 artists to paint a potato; you would get every variation under the sun. Including the smart alec who would literally paint a real potato blue and hand it to you. In the same vein, if you asked 100 programmers to develop an accounts receivable application, you would get 100 very different applications, written on many different platforms. Some will be high end and some very low quality. Let’s go further, ask 100 network engineers to assemble a network and you will get a wide array of configurations, with varying throughput and security levels.
If you accept this concept as true, you will be able to improve how technology gets done, because your behavior will be driven by two major changes. The first is, you will change the way you hire technology people. Instead of just looking at the price, you will also look at the quality level of their skill. You will also look deeper into their portfolio. You will actually ask to see screen shots of things they have built. You will more tightly couple what they get paid, to the quality level you need. Would you hire some newbie art student to paint your portrait for $20? Or would you hire a professional that charges $500? The $20 solution would likely look so amateur it would be worthless. Such is the case with low skill IT people. Regardless of their price, the quality of the product cannot be used. The reality is, you get what you pay for with technology people in most cases. I want people with vision, skills, and innovative talent. I want them to be aware of the latest trends in design. I want them to be unnaturally attached to quality – just like an emotional artist. This also allows you to pay them higher wages than you ever thought possible because you start to understand that for the $20K a year difference between a mediocre programmer and a star, you get $100K in bottom line results.
The second change you will make is, you start looking at your overall digital plumbing as more of an art project. You will understand that the painting is never done. There are always improvements that can be made – in fact – should be made. The picture is never pretty enough. You would also ensure your digital plumbing is not just a series of boxes, wires and software, but is a living breathing ecosystem that turns raw data into organizational wisdom. And knowing this, you would invest in it constantly, and strategically. Computers and software upgrades cease to be regarded as expensive upgrades that have little value and would be looked at more for the ROI they bring. For the operational beauty they create in your organization. You would actually make your IT people create large maps that visually show the way all your software relates to each application, and how your network architecture is designed because you would want to see from a high level how it all flows. Who cares about the details, you just want to understand how the art hangs together.
Best of all, once you understand the way your artists have assembled this collage of digital tools, you will be able to overlay your knowledge of how the business flows in order to apply interesting concepts like White Collar Lean in order to automate back office processes. And when your artists (programmers) try to tell you something can’t be done, or that something is too difficult, you will know this is not true -anything can be painted with the right tools and person behind the brushes. What they really mean is they cannot get it done.
There have always been clues to the reality of technology as art… Why do you think programmers dress like starving artists – even on the job? Why do you think IT people are so emotional and volatile? Why is it that 5 different developers always give you 5 different answers to any question you asked? Let’s end where we began… Technology is a difference maker. Learning to put it in place in the right ways can make the difference between living and dying in this day and age. This puts a huge responsibility on the executive levels of an organization to step up and guide the technology strategy in the organization, and you will not be able to guide well if you do not understand at a deep level that technology is art – and the people who build it are artists.
