Thoughts on Technology Use Planning

The recent assignment about Technology Use Planning got me thinking about, well, technology use planning! Honestly, the concept was completely new to me, though it makes complete sense why a company or school/university would need to plan ahead and think about their use of technology in the future.

In one of my previous jobs I worked for a non-profit. The computer I used when I worked there was about 8 years old, and slow as molasses. Sadly, we didn't have the resources to upgrade, so I don't think technology use planning was even on anyone's radar. At my current job, we try to stay on top of all things technology. All of the employees are issued an iPhone (4s, not the 5!) upon starting with the company, and we all have laptops issued to us, as well. We have a few iPads floating around the office, plus plenty of software for the instructional designers to use. Despite all of this, I'm not even sure we have any sort of technology use plan in place at all, and this assignment has made me want to ask what our plan is (it's a small company with less than 20 employees, and it's easy to find out information like that.)

I also started thinking about how this concept might be applicable in my personal life. My husband and I just sort of buy something if we need it, for instance, his six-year-old desktop computer was starting to be on the fritz, so he purchased a laptop, but we don't really look to the future to figure out what we might want or need, or talk about what our goals for our technology use are. I think it might be beneficial to discuss this, though, because then we might be able to plan for and budget for future purchases, and discuss what works best for us as a family. Right now he doesn't have a smartphone and my company pays for mine, but where do we want to be with that in a year or two? Do we want a tablet? Should we get a printer with wireless capabilities since we both have laptops now?

I actually really like planning, so I may start thinking about how I can apply this in my life, both at work and at home!