Defining what is a technology company

It’s natural to associate the idea of a technology company with giants like Google, Meta, Apple, and Microsoft, or with substantial scientific innovation ventures like NASA or the biotechnology consortium responsible for the rapid development of COVID-19 vaccines. Beyond these, however, countless companies around the world create advanced technology, and, for many others, technology permeates every aspect of their business.

Regardless of the industry or even its size, in a technology company, all processes are evaluated carefully, in an intentional way, with a learning mentality, and the entire company eventually operates through computer systems. And this isn’t just about adopting digital processes or automation. Above all, it’s working on day-to-day activities and defining corporate priorities, considering how technology will make a difference to the business now and in the future —especially when the company’s growth creates the need to scale and diversify its products and services.

In a technology company, all processes are evaluated carefully, in an intentional way, with a learning mentality, and the entire company eventually operates through computer systems.

A family-run micro-business may not yet fit the “technology company” category and may not even want to. However, if the business prospers and expands significantly, growing to 30, then 300, and even 1,000 people, it will become inevitable to consider, at some point, that only with technology as an integral part of the business will the company be able to improve its delivery network, receive and make payments, keep supplier and customer databases up to date, match payroll with employee data, and account for income and expenses.  

Technology in the foreground

It’s more than just small businesses that at some point need to re-evaluate their relationship with technology and overcome the belief that having an IT department is enough to solve technical problems as they arise. The same goes for medium-sized and large companies, corporations, and even governments, which can be at financial and reputational risk if their software is not secure and designed with internal and external dependencies in mind, and does not scale.

Consider, for example, what usually happens when there is a lot of simultaneous access to a free product distribution website or mandatory registration on the last day of the deadline (or if you are a Swiftie and want concert tickets). If the system isn’t built with this kind of scale in mind, it will inevitably crash.

A poorly designed system can mean anything, from lost purchases in a jewelry store because the credit cards didn’t go through to a patient’s data not being accessible to hospital staff or millions in losses if the breakdown is widespread in a banking or retail platform. The proper coordination of technology in a public or private institution, be it tiny or huge, is vital in our world. 

It is all too common for organizations to perpetuate a disorganized process of managing technology, which tends to generate major losses over time —economic, technical, and human resources. This is even more common in companies that have grown too fast by using technical improvisation, also known as hacks, or unsustainable solutions built in-house or acquired from other companies.  

In a technology environment without specific and well-thought-out management, there is no room for optimizing existing procedures and little chance of creative and innovative ideas that could represent a real competitive leap for the company. Larry Page, founder and former CEO of Google, used to say that we often need radical changes rather than incremental ones. That is only possible if we intentionally think about innovation.

Leadership and technology processes

To avoid cycles that risk the very existence of the business, it would be ideal for any company to understand its momentum and expansion potential and invest in technology management at early stages—in the same way, for example, that it may decide to bring in a human resources management professional when the number of employees exceeds a certain threshold.

However, as the ideal way is rarely the way the world works, it’s more realistic to assume that companies will adopt technology management when there is already some level of disorganization and a lot to fix. The sooner the platform mindset is at the heart of decisions in all divisions, the better. 

And how do you take this from theory to practice? The first step would be to structure the technology area with well-defined leadership, culture, systems, and processes. For a technology team to work well, it requires balance between: 

• Professionals with varying levels of experience
• Managers and individual contributors
• Time dedicated to the day-to-day “bread and butter” and time dedicated to innovation
• The necessity of meeting deadlines and the necessity of leaving some free time for creativity
• People with diverse backgrounds and different ways of thinking

 Achieving these balances is no simple task, and each company tends to come up with its solution. 

Regardless of the path between the ideal and the real world, it is essential to invest in a technology culture that can be accepted and implemented within all departments of the organization and to have a technology team capable of developing integrated solutions working in partnership with them. 

Once this is achieved, the company shouldn’t adopt a new sales channel, a logistics overhaul, or a people assessment system without involving the technology team. Technology becomes part of all these processes, not because the technology team is looking to boss around other areas of the company —but because all these processes would be co-created and supported by the technology team.   

It is essential to invest in a technology culture that can be accepted and implemented within all departments and to have a technology team capable of developing integrated solutions in partnership with them.

In companies without a technology department properly involved in its processes, it is common for systems to be developed or purchased with no participation of the right people for the job and no clear guidelines. These decisions may work temporarily, but they create huge problems in the long term because it’s harder to fix a system when you haven’t followed its implementation step by step. With a proper platform mindset, the engineering processes are carried out correctly from the start.