Last month, Christopher Gillespie wrote an interesting piece about the
true cost of a meeting. It got me thinking about how technology has made us so more efficient — at work, at home, in general — but we certainly do still spend a significant amount of time, well, just getting it to work. His column talked about how while yes, we are certainly concerned about improved efficiency when calculating ROI of technology costs, we don’t always think about the opportunity costs of making technology too complicated. If we cut back on features in some cases, the solution might cost less, which is good, at least for the end user — but it also also might result in, for example, fewer meetings starting late or being canceled because no one was around to troubleshoot something complicated. Like turning the system on. Those are unseen costs.
One thing about technology is that for most of history, a person has always had to tell a thing how to do the thing the person wants it to do, for example, through programming. Machine learning, artificial intelligence, is changing that. Today AVI-SPL’s Kell Bousman writes about how artificial intelligence will change collaboration, making meetings more productive and more efficient. Technology will, quite literally, be smarter — able to improve, prepare and even heal itself on its own — without [as much] input from humans. Weird.
Enjoy the weekend!
