Although most people see technological innovation as fairly recent, it’s hard to say when it really started.
Regardless of that, it is present in our routines without even noticing it and, the best thing, is that innovation that facilitates practically everything around us.
But, even with so many benefits, it is clear that all the changes have also brought some challenges that need to be presented in order to think together of solutions that can solve them.
Here are the top five obstacles to technological innovation:
1- Digital inclusion
Including all people in technological media has always been and will be an obstacle to technological innovation.
Unfortunately, not everyone has access to the Internet or even to any type of product created from the changes that occur around the world, and the consequences of this are the most varied.
It is possible, for example, that poor communities that do not have access to technologies remain stuck in the past in terms of professional and even personal development.
Not counting the small daily hassles, like getting to talk to someone using the phone or even sending an email to someone who is miles away.
This type of technological innovation helps our routine actions but often does not go through the minds of people who are not included in the digital world.
2 – Critical Sense
If, on the one hand, technological innovation provides us with quick access to daily information or world news, it also contributes to a lack of critical sense.
The critical sense is the ability we have to doubt things, whether they are worthy of doubt or not.
The Internet, for example, brought in a mass of new people concentrated in small venues like and news sites. This being the case, the amount of news and information circulating in these media is astronomical.
Therefore, it is easy to get lost during conversations or reading the news and, thus, not be able to identify what is false or not.
As the amount of information is very large, it is up to the Internet user to analyze it correctly with his critical sense.
However it is not always so.
The critical sense seems to decrease as the amount of information exchanged on the network increases and, mainly, when a person begins to develop their ideas in a way that influences the opinion of other users.
3 – High investment
One of the problems of technological innovation is the high investment that small and medium-sized companies must make.
At first, the value required to implement certain technologies in a business may be higher than you expect.
However, the return for small and medium-sized companies is very satisfactory. Therefore, it becomes more of an investment than an expense.
However, we know that those who are just starting out are not always prepared to invest such a high value at the beginning.
Therefore, it is necessary to prepare and even think about what technological solutions are the most fundamental at the beginning of a business.
4 – Obsolete products
With technological innovation, more and more products are emerging, and that is a double-edged sword.
While technology improves and helps make material goods more efficient, old products quickly become obsolete.
It is possible to see this clearly with mobile phones. A smartphone from three years ago is no longer as strong and powerful as today’s. Or, worse than that, a device created 6 months ago is no longer the most recent.
The main problem with the rapid pace of products is that the more new products are launched, the greater the discard.
The amount of e-waste present throughout the world has increased greatly and we do not have efficient means to interrupt that growth.
It seems paradoxical because, deep down, we need technologies to invent efficient means of interrupting this problem. However, this is another pending and present challenge in technological innovation.
5 – Unskilled labor
Do you remember that we talked about the problem of digital inclusion?
The lack of technological innovation in some areas can become a producer of unskilled labor.
As digital inclusion does not happen spontaneously and efficiently in all regions of the world, many people do not have access to what is new. And since the market is always looking for up-to-date people, the lack of technological knowledge also increases unemployment.
In the end, whoever is not updated and closely following technological innovation remains in the past, which disqualifies the workforce of these people.
However, despite this challenge, due to access to information it is possible to find very well qualified people for various types of services.
Like all sectors, the company was shaped according to technological innovation. If before studying and improving in some area for free was impossible, today it has become very common.
The free materials available on the Internet, for example, are just some of the benefits that innovation has brought to humanity.
Advantages of technological innovation
Despite the challenges presented above, there are several advantages that technological innovation provided.
Those that are easily perceptible are separated below:
1 – Access to education
Before the technological innovation, almost nobody had access to the . Despite hearing about the classes given by radio and even letters, that was an unthought-of resource.
In the end, how would it be possible to take tests, for example, or talk with the teacher from one city to another and in a short time?
Without Internet access, that was a practically impossible activity. But with technological innovation also came opportunity and access to education.
Currently, to study any content within one’s own home, it is enough to have a mobile device or computer and Internet access. This allows people to better prepare for the job market and for other areas of life.
2 – Increased productivity
Within companies, technological innovation was very well received.
With circuits that control machines, industries exponentially. What used to take two days became possible in just a few hours.
Furthermore, not only have activities become more efficient, but new jobs have also been generated.
Software developers and hardware creators received the demand from the industries in a resounding way.
Technology, while creating difficulties at some points, opened doors and opportunities for those who managed to follow this transformation.
3 – Tracking metrics and data
Nowadays, saving all the data related to a business is no longer a problem.
The old notebook has been replaced by databases and existing computer technology.
Not only where data is stored has changed, but also the amount of information we have at our disposal.
The numbers and those of any business have become more accessible and, with this, it is possible to think of assertive actions to improve some aspect of any business.
With this information, improving sales and observing how the public behaves has become a much easier task.
4 – Relationship with the client
The technology not only gave the opportunity for the customer to approach the company and vice versa, but also created a new type of relationship and dialogue between the two.
With social networks, blogs and the most varied means of communication between company and client, it has become increasingly common for brands.
In addition to maintaining contact with the customer, it is possible to trace their personality and identify which customers are (or are not) more likely to buy a certain product.
5 – Sales growth
Sales strategies, along with relationship marketing, became much stronger and more efficient.
Before the technological innovation, the means of disclosure were limited and did not reach customers accurately. There was television, outdoors and radios for which they were generally intrusive.
Today, although it is still common to advertise a product on television, there are other marketing strategies that offer a good experience to those who are browsing the Internet.
Social networks, sites, blogs, email and other means of communication help educate potential customers and still attract a new audience to your business.
Join the digital transformation
Technological innovation is already part of almost everyone’s life and that only tends to grow.
Of course, as you have already seen, there are some obstacles that still need to be overcome, but the advantages that digital transformation has brought to the world and, mainly to the market, are unquestionable.
The role of the entrepreneur is not only to take advantage of the facilities that these innovations bring to his business, but also to think of ways to use them to help solve small social problems.
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