The Role of Technology Forecasting and Planning: Formulating Business Strategy
| Published date | 01 February 1992 |
| Date | 01 February 1992 |
| Pages | 3-16 |
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1108/02635579210009623 |
| Author | D.T. Brownlie |
| Subject Matter | Economics,Information & knowledge management,Management science & operations |
THE ROLE OF TECHNOLOGY FORECASTING AND PLANNING: FORMULATING BUSINESS STRATEGY 3
T
he link between research and develop-
ment and business strategy in planning
long-range technology is described.
The Role of
Technology
Forecasting
and Planning:
Formulating Business
Strategy
D.T. Brownlie
Industrial Management & Data Systems, Vol. 92 No. 2, 1992, pp. 3-16
© MCB University Press Limited, 0263-5577
Introduction
The early work of writers such as Dill[l] Chandler[2]
Andrews[3] Downs[4] and Lawrence and Lorsch[5] has
stimulated and guided enquiry into the constraining
influence of the external business environment on the
choices (goals) and courses of action (strategies) available
to the firm. In the long term survival is thought to be a
function of
how well
the firm is able to adapt its capabilities
to match the conditions imposed by an inconstant
environment.
A highly volatile technological environment and
unpredictable competitive circumstances are characteristic
conditions of a turbulent business climate[6]. In its
broadest sense, the subject of
this
article is the business
practice that has evolved to help cope with the irregularity
and unpredictability of environmental change, so to
enhance the likelihood of survival in the adversity of such
a turbulent business climate. Gluck[7] suggests that the
turbulence of the business environment is a function of
the frequency, the amount and the irregularity of the
change that occurs in it. It considers specifically the
powerful and pervasive influence of technological change
which has itself emerged during the last 20 years both
as the product and the progenitor of many significant
industrial, social and political
changes.
Moreover, it takes
the view that in many industries the basis of long-term
competitive success is moving towards technology as the
means of securing a sustainable comparative advantage.
Several authors have propounded this view, among them
being Ansoff and Stewart[8], Hayes and Abernathy[9],
Frohman[10] and Kantrow[11].
The widespread feeling of uncertainty that surrounds the
future of our industrial base is largely attributed to the
rapid technological advance of recent years. The view is
also taken that in the 1990s the gathering pace of technical
development and substitution
will
continue to create many
new threats and opportunities which will further
undermine the confidence with which established industry
looks to the future
—
placing some on the threshold of
growth and survival, others near
to
stagnation and decline.
The gathering pace of technological change and the
growing complexity of the management problems that
arise as a result of it are thought to compel the firm to
project itself
into
the technological future. At the level
of
the firm it makes sound commercial sense to not only
anticipate technical development which could render
products obsolete, but also to know in which directions
to point research efforts to develop the technology on
which future new products
will
be
based[12].
Technology
forecasts have been described as vehicles that force an
explicit consideration of the technological future[13,14].
However, their purpose is not necessarily to predict the
precise form technology will take in a given application
at some specific future date. Taking
a
heuristic
view,
they
indicate the likely paths of long-term technological change
so that the potential and feasibility of possible future
developments can be assessed.
The greater the volatility
of
technological
change,
the more
the firm must focus its analysis of trends, events and
possibilities on the technological component of the
environment[7]. However, the response of firms to the
volatile technological environment is thought not only to
involve the monitoring and forecasting of technological
change. These activities need to form integral parts of
the process of formulating a long-term strategy for the
development of the firm's technology base (four broad
strategies for technological development are identified in
Table I). The firm's technology planning will direct R&D
effort towards objectives, the attainment of which
will
support the successful implementation of its long-term
strategy
plans.
Technology decisions in general, and R&D
decisions in particular, must therefore be taken within the
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