Technology is Pervasive But a Robot Mopping the Floor... Really?

With young kids we tend to take a pragmatic laid back approach to household cleanliness. If you even get the time to sporadically clean, it will quickly become untidy and dirty, so why bother?

You've probably heard about the automatic little sweepers and moppers available today. We received a gift of one from a family member who was clearly tired of treading on a permanently dirty floor when visiting. Not so subtle a gift, but you can't argue about the practicality of it.

It functions with the aid of a GPS box. Now before you make assumptions, our home is modest and does not require a GPS to find your way around. The GPS does help our new rodent-like friend to find his way around the floor plan. Notice, I did refer to it in the male gender as from a young age my, before-her-time-Irish-mother, was over the top at insuring I did my fair share of household chores on top of the many garden chores that my four sisters were spared from.

Enough of the self-pity and back to the mopping. It works with minimal effort on our part although it takes about four times as long as the human version. Not dissimilar to its human counterpart, our little friend gets lost sometimes and appears to be driving around aimlessly. If we assume it's a she then perhaps it's spending time chatting to the GPS and not as interested in following the directions. If it’s a he, then there must be an egotistical and stubborn refusal ingrained to ask for directions. Regardless, after some awkward maneuvers and changes in direction, he or she somehow gets the job done.

You have to love the American ability to take all little inconveniences out of our daily lives. I've got to go away now and invent a device that potty trains kids in less than an hour. Just remember; there is technology for everything, but knowing which, when and where to use it is still the purview of us humans.

Is your technology strategy at a crossroad?

In the vast majority of businesses, technology is now deeply ingrained in all operational functions and continues to increase in complexity. Ironically, advances such as virtualization make it more complex for small IT departments to manage and provide many of the benefits that are driving great efficiencies across public and private clouds. What are the implications for the IT decision maker?

In short, there are more choices than ever regarding IT functions and efficiency. You can keep the status quo with your own IT team and IT infrastructure, you can outsource it all to all sorts of providers, or you can settle somewhere in between. Savvy IT decision makers are focusing internal IT efforts on development and strategy to fuel growth, and leaving the infrastructure to trusted partners.

The deep recession and current slow growth economy has tightened the purse strings for the C-level executive. Unlike Fortune 500 companies, most businesses are not sitting on stockpiles of cash. They are eking out a profit and conserving the cash as a risk mitigation strategy. Outsourcing some of the expertise required in IT became an economic necessity for most businesses.

The pervasiveness of Internet connectivity, mobility and greater acceptance of remote access and security of your personal data has led to much greater acceptance of 'cloud computing' in the business world. Within ‘the cloud’ there are all kinds of flavors to choose from depending on your needs.

Confused? There is no need to rush a decision. Talk to your peers, research what's out there, test a number of different providers and make a decision after weighing the pros and cons. The best advice is to let your business needs, not your technology needs, drive your decision. Base your business decision on your reliability, flexibility and predictability needs.

Finally ask yourself if technology is a core competency for your business or a business enabler. If it's truly a core competency then keep the expertise in house. If it's an enabler that currently distracts you from focusing on your core business then move down the path of outsourcing.  It’s likely your business is at a crossroad, not the technology.