Why Tech Comm Has Made Things Better, Not Worse

Here’s the irony: you’d think that with the passage of time more Baby Boomers would appreciate the marvels of technology. After all, technology has been around for awhile. Software was invented in the 50’s and we’ve had personal computers since the 80’s, starting with Apple computers and IBM PCs.

The reason you would think that they would embrace change is because they were the generation that fought for social improvement after the World War II generation began to retire. They were the most inclusive generation in history, fighting against the Vietnam War, racial discrimination, and discrimination against women, gays, and lesbians.

Yet now many baby boomers, particularly those past their 50’s, are quick to condemn technology, harping on the good old days when family and friends spent more time quality time together talking in person, when a handshake would be enough to seal a deal, and when you could go for a walk through a park without encountering people tuning out the world with ear buds listening to music from an mp3 player.

This rosy view of the past is far from accurate. Communication was much more challenging in the good old day, and instant communication the stuff of sci-fi. It was easier to be manipulated by political machinations propagated by mainstream media because there was no way to access alternative news channels. And if you got lost in a new city, you had no GPS to guide you home.

Let’s take a quick look at how tech comm has made life better in the office and at home:

Tech Comm in the Office

It’s easier than ever to become successful in business—whether you work as a solopreneur or run a small business. What’s more, costs are far lower than ever before.

Here are 4 reasons why it’s easier and less expensive to run a business:

1. You can work from anywhere at any time.

In the past, you needed to work from an office because you needed to use office equipment to get work done, whether it was using a landline or checking email from a desktop computer. Now you can work from anywhere using a laptop, netbook, tablet, or mobile phone. Besides the use of portable hardware, software, too, has become more versatile. Enterprise instant messenger software can allow you to send secure private messages through the use of strong encryption to all data transfers, use a wide variety of devices, and even communicate with multicultural teams through a language translator.

2. It’s easier for customers to make purchases.

There is a good reason why Amazon and Ali Baba are billion dollar companies. It’s because they have made it much easier for people to find the products they want and buy it quickly online. Instead of going to a store to buy products, the products are shipped to them.

3. Sales presentations are now much more persuasive.

Today, sales aren’t restricted to verbal descriptions or setting up a room with flip charts and slide projectors. It’s as easy as creating a PowerPoint presentation on a laptop. People are more inclined to buy when they understand what a product can do for them, and it’s now easy to demonstrate using graphs, images, and videos how a product works.

4. Managing projects can be done efficiently.

Paper-based record-keeping is clumsy. It’s difficult to keep track of change. With software, it’s simple to collaborate, administer, and track a project from concept to completion (C2C).

Tech Comm at Home

Contrary to many claims that technology has ruined family lives, here are four good reasons why you can argue that it has improved family life.

1. Coordinating busy schedules is a breeze.

A child doesn’t have to worry about getting stranded at school after an extracurricular activity or at the airport after an arrival. A change of plans can be communicated to parents via email, phone, or text.

2. Connectedness and safety.

It’s much easier for couples to stay in touch during their workday, sending quick text messages during breaks. It’s easier for children to stay in touch with their parents should they ever get into trouble.

The Real Reason for Condemning Tech Comm

If things are getting better in the office and on the home front, why is it not uncommon to find those in their fifties or sixties complain about how tech comm has made things worse? Instead of embracing technology, the older generation condemns it. They look at the gaming habits of millenniums and shake their heads. They talk about how abbreviations like OMG, BBF, TTYL, and LMAO have just ruined the elegance of the English language. They have a distorted picture of America before communication technology went mainstream.

Here’s what may actually be happening: the issue is not technology itself, it’s psychology.

The issue is not that technology has destroyed intimacy, disrupted the chance to have great conversations, and dumbed down humanity. It’s something else entirely – an unwillingness to adapt to change.

The reason many people in the older generation don’t like technology is because they don’t understand it. They struggle with social media. They are bewildered by software updates. They can’t figure out how to fire up a browser, close a tab, or minimize a screen. And they think smartphones just have too many apps available.

Technology has made life much easier if you know what buttons to press. And as for dumbing down the human race, there is more information available about everything than ever before in the history of the human race.