Jackie Fenn encourages tech planners to monitor emerging strategic technology and innovation she lists on the Gartner hype cycle (head up) of technologies.

Mobile and wireless technologies, devices, and services continue to be an active area for emerging technology groups. Areas such as RFID, sensor networks, and location-aware technologies and applications continue to mature slowly, but still offer both near-term and long-term promise as high-impact technologies.

I think strategic education planners will find uses in schools for each of these groups.

Fenn said the hype cycle should be used along with a planning model such as the Gartner priority matrix [see below], which highlights the technologies we believe are worth adopting early because of their potentially high impact. However the actual benefit will vary significantly across industries so planners need to ascertain which of these individual opportunities relate most closely to their organisational requirements.

Behavioural economics also makes its debut on this year’s hype cycle. This established academic discipline aims to understand how people actually make decisions instead of assuming ‘rational behaviour’. Leading edge enterprises are beginning to use it.

Fenn predicts that 3-D printing market will expand to on-demand and on-site printing of models and to create models of avatars or even children and pets.

She also thinks behavioural economics appears to have the potential dramatically to improve during the next decade product and service design, e-commerce business models, sales and marketing effect, website design and the general quality of management decision making.

I suggest that educators responsible for strategic planning of IT may find uses for 3-D printing and behavioural economics in understanding why some mobile PC implementations in schools work better for improving student learning rates than others.


Jackie Fenn has been authoring the Gartner hype cycle for emerging technologies for 12 years.

Gartner, Inc. (NYSE: IT) claims it is the world's leading information technology research and advisory company.

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