INVESTMENTS IN SERVICE sector technology have perhaps been less carefully monitored than have those in manufacturing sector technology. This paper analyzes the reasons for service-sector technology’s sometimes disappointing performance and proposes a systematic approach to technology investment planning and implementation.
A BANK. FORECLOSED on a loan and took control of a small piece of real estate. The .property was later found to be contaminated with hazardous wastes and, after a long-drawn-out court case, the bank was held liable for half a million dollars.T
SERVICE TECHNOLOGIES are not just revolutionizing internal organizational configurations. They are restructuring whole industries'—and nations'—entire competitive postures. Service technologies now provide sufficient scale economies, flexibility, efficiency, and specialization potentials that outside vendors can supply many important corporate functions at greatly enhanced value and lower cost.
SOME AUTHORS, AND EVEN SOME popular journals, have noted examples of the radical new organizational forms now emerging. The first article in our SMR double feature illuminates the technological and services bases of these changes — and examines how to manage them successfully. (The second feature immediately follows.) Both articles build on the authors’ earlier works published by Sloan Management Review, Scientific American, and the National Academy Press.