Appraising technology is a bit like valuing an antique or a share of stock; perspective is everything. What is bid and what is asked may be worlds apart, but when they converge contracts ensue to exchange property and service for fortune. One difference is that products of technology typically devalue with wear or age except, possibly, in antiquity. Stock prices, on the other hand, are largely speculations about expected future business performance. One more point: technology is not only desired, it is increasingly recognized as essential. Thus its value derives as much from utility as anticipation.
Imagine Substance
The marvels of technology seem to have done just that - be useful, that is. Hardly a job has not been turned on its ear for the sake of improved tools, information, and process. Is any productive office left untouched first by telephones, then copiers, faxes, and computers? These technologies customarily play a key role in determining the victorious in market shoot-outs among competing firms. For one thing, it changes who gets hired. Of course, most of this journal's readers and writers - your editor not least among them - want the dynamics of innovation and applied technologies to remain reliably in place. Indeed, even the chatter of popular press has evolved from the blue sky musing over fantastic possibilities toward the need for innovation to be part and parcel of strategic business management - useful, reliable, safe, profitable.
Betting the Farm
One interesting thing about technology in the past several generations is that so many individuals have committed their careers to it while so many others have hinged their investments on it. Whether ownership or employment, the incentive for things to work in the lab and marketplace is not subtle.
It is clear that the value of innovation not only floats careers and companies, but economies as well. Technological innovation is sufficiently influential so as to be important, and pervasive enough such that it can be managed very well. Its role in the GNP is huge. More interesting is its almost single-handed role in fueling professional job growth. Thus, "Valuing Technology" is a fitting theme for the Review.
In appreciation . . .
It is fortunate and appropriate that the Review was able to attract Dr. Lois Peters of Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute as Guest Editor for this issue, titled "Valuing Technology." The topic is as complex as it is important, yet I trust the reader will find information and perspective within that will be of direct value. Her efforts in assembling this issue are most appreciated.
This topic also aligns well with the theme of 1998 IEEE EMS International Engineering Management Conference (IEMC '98) titled Pioneering New Technologies: Management Issues and Challenges in the Third Millennium. The conference will be held October 11-13, 1998 in San Juan, Puerto Rico, and promises to be most worthwhile. I encourage you to attend; a registration form is provided at the back of this issue of the Review.
Technology is good, but we can still circumvent its benefits. A case in point is the editorial presented in the Spring 1998 issue of the Review. There were enough errors to make a good grammarian cry. My sincere apology to all readers for printing an uncorrected and unreviewed file.