The Company of the Future
- Article 30 of 77
- Information Age, February 2002
Books about how the Internet, IT and collaborative techniques will revolutionise companies frequently have the open-mouthed, uncritical vacancy of an infomercial. But Frances Cairncross, author of The Company of the Future, has avoided the pitfalls that her predecessors have fallen into, to produce a book that is a useful primer for IT decision makers wanting to know how technology can enhance an organisation rather than simply deplete its coffers.
As with most 'next big things' in IT, on paper, collaborative commerce will revolutionise how organisations conduct business – both internally and with their trading partners. If – and it's a big if – companies are able to exchange data and integrate their applications without the need for human intervention and without having to convert formats, collaborative commerce will reduce the costs of working and improve company intelligence.
But just as the promises made for Linux, ERP, data warehousing, intranets and other innovations frequently collapsed as 'vision' was replaced by practicalities, so collaborative commerce is already coming up against the harsh problems of reality.
To Cairncross's credit, she has not taken the easy path trod by so many technology company executives who put their company's cheerleading chants into books. Instead, she has produced a thoughtful look at the pros and cons of the technology, the changes in business processes necessary to use it successfully, and the risks involved in adopting it.
She shows scepticism towards claims and practices that do not withstand scrutiny – for example, US IT companies that lack the understanding of cultural differences needed to make collaboration work globally – while remaining relatively upbeat about the decline in the IT market. The chapter on supply chain management is particularly insightful, showing where collaborative commerce has possibly the most benefits for large corporations, and how they can change their business processes accordingly.
The book is at its weakest when it strays from business practice and possibilities and tries to explain technology. Cairncross's understanding of Linux is particularly weak, while her belief that privacy advocates are “curmudgeons” and her references to 'Doom' as the illegal game of choice in corporations show that she is clearly more at home dealing with CEO issues than working at the shop-floor implementation level.
For those who want to understand collaborative technology's possibilities and are not inclined to wade through a public relations exercise disguised as a book, The Company of the Future is an excellent choice of reading material.