Issue link: https://www.e-digitaleditions.com/i/57337
From the Editors The Time Zone of Technology About a month ago, I e-mailed a colleague to ask a work-related question. He responded a few minutes later to tell me he couldn't give me a comprehensive answer until he'd returned from a trip overseas. I e-mailed back to inquire, "Where are you now?" He replied, "On a bus in Istanbul." The whole exchange struck me as a microcosm of our modern society. We were using sophisticated technology to communicate instantaneously across time zones, across oceans, around the world. And we were discussing global business. I'm fascinated by the idea that technology has rendered both time and location irrelevant. As it happens, my colleague and I were having a real-time conversation, but e-mail has made asynchronous communication one of the simplest and most pervasive tools available to today's businessperson. It has rendered the clock obsolete. As a TV junkie, I'm also intrigued by the way technology has warped the notion of time in the field of entertainment, particularly as television networks wrestle with the issue of "time-shifted viewing." Fewer television viewers are catching their favorite shows as they air—instead they record them on DVR, access them online, or down- load them to their MP3 players to watch when they want. Television producers are still trying to determine how to count these nontraditional viewers, but they better figure it out fast. The more viewers turn to time-shifted devices for their entertain- ment, the more such technology will determine whether a show succeeds or fails. Technology is rewriting the rules of businesses in many fields outside of entertain- ment—and that means it's having a profound impact on business schools across the curriculum. In this issue of BizEd, we examine some of the ways schools are embrac- ing technology. Allen H. Kupetz asks "Is the Paperless Classroom Possible?" as he details all the ways technology can change the classroom. In "Technology at Work," Lee Schlenker and Adam Mendelson recommend that business schools teach their students only the tools that will be so prevalent in the workplace that they will "practi- cally disappear into the woodwork." In "Teaching Business in a Web 2.0 World," we explore the ways business schools are tapping into Web 2.0 technologies to enhance student learning, establish dynamic connections among their communities, and respond more quickly to advances in business. If none of that seems challenging enough, go to YouTube and search for a video called "Shift Happens" by Karl Fisch and Scott McLeod. It's a head-spinning look at the changes to come in the world and how hard it will be for education to keep up. While predictions are inherently fallible, the creators of the video paint a picture of a tech-enabled future so rapidly changing that it literally leaves viewers dizzy. Welcome to the new, ever-adapting, technologically complex world of business. It's as big as the planet, as accessible as your cell phone, and avail- able 24 hours a day. It's a stark fact that technology is only going to grow more complicated as it evolves—and the best business school programs will evolve right along with it. ■ z 6 BizEd JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2008 BILL BASCOM