While sitting in a meeting room the other day, I found myself thinking about a simple question. What is the goal or purpose of technology?
My first thought was that technology exists to make a task easier for the person using it. That led me to another thought. If that is the case, why are people so opposed to technology at times?
I believe at its core technology is meant to solve a specific problem in a more efficient way. Sometimes that efficiency shows up as a time saver. Other times it is simply necessary when dealing with large amounts of data or complexity that would be impossible to manage manually. Technology allows us to scale our efforts beyond what a single person or even a team of people could reasonably handle.
I also think a lot of the resistance comes from fear, especially when technology threatens jobs. If payroll once required ten people but now only needs two because of software automation, there is no comfort for the eight people who are suddenly out of work. Efficiency does not mean much when you are the one being displaced.
Even so, the overall benefit is often greater because of that efficiency. I understand how hollow that can sound to someone who lost their job, and I do not want to dismiss that reality. But I do believe the answer is not to reject technology. The answer is to learn it, adapt to it, and continue to advance alongside it. Technology is not going away, and fighting it usually leaves people further behind.
Ideally, technology should free us. I would love to live in a world like The Jetsons, where a full workday is only three hours long. With that extra time, I could spend more of it with my family, work on hobbies, or volunteer in my community. That is the promise technology always seems to make, even if we have not fully realized it yet.
At its core, technology should enhance our lives by making things simpler and giving us back time. Time to focus on what actually matters. It should not make us poorer through fear or displacement, but richer through opportunity, creativity, and connection.
These are just my thoughts, but they are thoughts I keep coming back to whenever I see people push back against progress.
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