article thumbnail

How I Learned the Hard Way That Aging Technology Is Expensive

Harvard Business Review

Companies love to stretch out their investments in existing technology as long as possible, a policy whose faulty logic I recently rediscovered in my role as CIO. As chief information officer of my family, I had purchased two used 333 MHz iMac G3s with 160MB of RAM in Bondi blue for my children to play games on.

article thumbnail

What I Learned from Leading a Tunisian Ministry During the Arab Spring

Harvard Business Review

After the toppling of Dictator Ben Ali in January 2011, whose stifling reign lasted nearly a quarter century, the country faced a rocky start to a new ruling order. Just like a technology company, we intentionally physically set up our “lab” on the opposite side of Tunis, far from the main body of government.