The Changing Demands of the Technological World

“The shape, structure and hierarchy of the corporation has not responded to the huge flow of information that companies now have at their fingertips…  They had computerized their 20th Century shape rather than responding to how the computer network was upending much of what they had been set up to do decades before.  It was one of the many things they don’t teach you in business school.”

-Peter Day, “Imagine a World Without Shops and Factories”

In this article by Day, given to me by my husband, a director in the customer analytics area, he talks about how companies have yet to respond to changing dynamic the internet has introduced into the business world.  The article discusses  how industry came to be what it is today with Ford’s manufacturing model and how the individualization of today’s society has made that model irrelevant to the modern consumer in the developed world.

I could not help but find parallels between this dialogue in the business world and that in the field of education today.  We, too, are trying to respond to a changing landscape- and ultimately preparing students for the environment Day is predicting for the future.

We, too, have more information about those whom we are serving than ever before and are struggling to figure out how to use it.

We, too, know that the internet and technology are paramount to students’ success but are in uncharted territory when it comes to how we can harness, and help students harness, this power.