Mission in Life

Rick J. Morris
N503 - Spring 2010
Mission in Life
January 21, 2010

My Mission in Life is simple. Being a Christian man, I want to naturally be able to help other people. However, I want to also get ahead in life and better myself. I find it very rewarding when these two missions come together for me. How does that relate to technology though?

In my observations, there is one major problem with technology. I often see the world in two different generations or groups. The first generation I like to call the more traditional generation. Like my mom for instance, she will not have anything to do with the internet and doesn’t even have an email address. If it were up to her she wouldn’t even own a computer. She likes to do things the more traditional style or old fashion way by way of writing a letter or picking up the phone. Where as we have my own generation. I like to call our generation the more modern generation. I like sending and receiving emails because I find it easier, instant, and more cost efficient. I like doing some of my business on-line for the very same reason. I think in our generation we are so use to change, that it doesn’t really faze us. We grew up with change and probably will adapt fairly quickly to future changes as well.

Let me give you an example. I work for The Church Federation of Greater Indianapolis. As with any organization they depend on funds to keep them afloat. In this economy, it has created a bit of a challenge to achieve funds. As with any business you have to keep up with the changes in culture or your business will die. In the case of The Church Federation, some of our major contributors come from two different generations. We need their money in order to survive. The two generations I describe are above. One prefers to do things the old fashion way and the other prefers to do things the more modern way.

In the example of The Church Federation, I have been involved in the development process of many projects. One major project I am working on now for them is the 2009 Annual Report. I also created their annual report from last year. Before I came into the picture the Annual Report had always been delivered by a printed source. Now things were different by introducing the material through an electronic means. The Annual Report was now being downloaded off our new website and CD. However, for some they did not handle this very well at all. They come from that traditional generation I was talking about earlier. The organization found themselves still printing out the annual report as a printed source. The whole purpose of creating an e-Book was to create a more cost efficient way for the media. Printing was found to be very costly. It ended up costing the organization more money in the long run by having to produce two ways of receiving the information.

The solution for now has been to print all materials and have electronic sources available. The problem is do we keep on providing two different means or sources to cater to the two different generations? With this economy we just don’t have the money or means to keep making both a paper format and an electronic format. Is there a better way or a more cost efficient way to do things here? I find myself asking; what can we do to bring these two generations together in terms of technology?