Archive for the ‘Technology’ Category

By Bruce Meraviglia, Technology & Marketing Editor The 18th Century was considered the beginning of the Industrial Revolution, in which new forms of mechanical devices and machines were introduced to improve productivity, lower cost, and allow for the manufacture of products that otherwise were not practical to produce.  In the 20th Century, we witnessed the beginning of the Information Revolution, the revolution which, more than ... Full story

By Bruce Meraviglia, Technology & Marketing Editor, Microfinance Focus In the early 1990’s, Robert Kaplan, a PhD-level professor of accounting at Harvard University, wrote a series of papers on how business should (could) consider the value of IT.  His principal position was that traditional accounting standards had no valid methodology for quantifying the value of IT in terms of its benefits to the organization (beyond the ... Full story

Bruce Meraviglia , Technology & Marketing Editor The theme for this month’s issue is Social Performance Management (SPM), as highlighted in several of our articles.  In our first Marketing Reflections column (February 2009), I mentioned that one of the primary roles of the marketing department was the creation of a brand image for its organization; in our context, the MFI it is a part of.  A key to the creation of any brand, especially one that you would like to have enduring value, is the sense of being able to trust the company the brand represents. Full story

Bruce Meraviglia , Technology & Marketing Editor The answer to the questions above is “Yes!”  Since the beginning of mankind’s invention of new technologies, and new ways of using those technologies, the debate as to whether social policy should guide (or constrain) the development of technology, or whether technology should be created independently of social policy, with the outcome then informing those who create social policy as to what is possible, has raged back and forth.  With the movement to create a Social Performance Management (SPM) standard gaining momentum, the issue of technology once again comes into play. Full story

Bruce Meraviglia , Technology & Marketing Editor This month we begin a new technology column for Microfinance Focus.  This column will review current technologies that may offer benefits for MFI’s, either for internal use or for the benefit of their borrowers – perhaps even to serve as potential business concepts the MFI may choose to present to potential borrowers.  The technologies that will be reviewed will range from Information Technology (IT) to renewable energy, and such technologies in between that may be of interest to the MFI community.  Each column will be complemented by an online Technology Review blog by the author on the Microfinance Focus website that will allow for feedback from the readers of this magazine. For this month’s column, we will discuss the issue of computer software for use within the MFI itself.  In the field of software development, every organization has traditionally been faced with determining whether it is better off paying for its own IT personnel to develop software to meet a specific need (Build), or to purchase appropriate software from an outside vendor (Buy), including the potential cost of modifying the commercially available software to suit the specific requirements of the organization.  This has traditionally been referred to as the Build versus Buy decision; a decision that each IT manager must make, and then defend to the executive committee of his organization. Full story