Technology-induced change is nothing new. The real question is not, What is the role of technology? Rather, the real question is, How do good-to-great organizations think differently about technology?

An accelerator, not a creator

When used right, technology becomes an accelerator of momentum, not a creator of it. The good-to-great companies never began their transitions with pioneering technology, for the simple reason that you cannot make good use of technology until you know which technologies are relevant. And which are those? Those - and only those - that link directly to the three intersecting circles of the Hedgehog Concept.

To make technology productive in a transformation from good to great means asking the following questions.

• Does the technology fit directly with your Hedgehog Concept?
• If yes, then you need to become a pioneer in the application of that technology.
• If no, then ask, do you need this technology at all?
• If yes, then all you need is parity (you don't necessarily need the world's most advanced phone system to be a great company).
• If no, then the technology is irrelevant, and you can ignore it.

The technology trap

80% of the good-to-great executives didn't even mention technology as one of the top five factors in the transition. Furthermore, in the cases where they did mention technology, it had a median ranking of fourth, with only two executives of 84 persons interviewed ranking it number one.

The evidence from the authors' study does not support the idea that technological change plays the principal role in the decline of once-great companies (or the perpetual mediocrity of others). Certainly, technology is important, you can't remain a laggard and hope to be great. But technology by itself is never a primary cause of either greatness or decline.

Thoughtless reliance on technology is a liability, not an asset. When used right, when linked to a simple, clear, and coherent concept rooted in deep understanding, technology is an essential driver in accelerating forward momentum. But when used wrong, when grasped as an easy solution, without a deep understanding of how it links to a clear and coherent concept, technology simply accelerates your own self-created demise.

The fear of being left behind

People in the good-to-great companies did talk about strategy, performance, becoming the best, and winning. But they never talked in reactionary terms and never defined their strategies principally in response to what others were doing. They talked in terms of what they were trying to create and how they were trying to improve relative to an absolute standard of excellence.

Those who built the good-to-great companies weren't motivated by fear. They weren't driven by fear of what they didn't understand, by fear of looking like a chump, by fear of watching others hit it big while they didn't, or by fear of being hammered by the competition.

No, those who turn good into great are motivated by a deep creative urge and an inner compulsion for sheer unadulterated excellence for its own sake. Those who build and perpetuate mediocrity, in contrast, are motivated more by the fear of being left behind.

"Crawl, walk, run" can be a very effective approach, even during times of rapid and radical technological change.