Technology philosophy #6 – Everything comes with a tradeoff

This is somewhat related to philosophy #5, in that no matter what decision you make about technology (or any other decision you make in life!),  you’re going to have to make trade-offs. In philosophy #5, I pointed out that “free” doesn’t mean “without cost.” In this case, the trade-off for free software was a cost of learning the software itself or paying someone to implement it on your behalf.

And so it is with all your technology decisions. Whatever you choose, you’ll be making a trade-off. You may choose software that has ALL the bells and whistles. The trade-off you’ll make is a higher price. You may choose technology that allows all of your staff to edit and post to your website (i.e., a CMS). The trade-off you’ll make is that control is decentralized and therefore, there is more risk of something being published in error. And so on.

Understanding that every decision comes with a trade-off gives you a different (and more appropriate) perspective on the choices you’re making.

About Wes Trochlil

For over 30 years, Wes has worked in and with dozens of associations and membership organizations throughout the US, ranging in size from zero staff (all-volunteer) to over 700. In that time Wes has provided a range of consulting services, from general consulting on data management issues to full-scale, association-wide selection and implementation of association management systems.

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