The virtual organisation has become a reality in technology and information based industries. Technology has increased the precision and speed with which we do almost everything - from the precision with which data can be captured, analysed, reported and disseminated, and the speed with which a highway or a car must be built, to the speed with which new technology itself can be created. Technology has also increased both the speed and complexity with which information can be transferred and processed with dramatic impacts on the speed of communication. There are opportunities and threats in abundance. Today more so than ever before the industry must develop its own way.
Grove points out that, managed wrongly, a strategic inflection point can mean the end of the game.
Managed right, it can turn into a powerful force. Clearly, we all want to manage it right. Ever-improving technology and communication is increasing the efficiency of data capture, analysis and reporting. We are seeing new methods of surveying including CAPI, internet, soon WAP, ever increasing sophistication in computer modelling, data, data mining, etc, larger more cost effective database systems. This kind of change, continuous improvement, has itself become almost a constant.