Standardization as a Business Tool

Sherrie Bolin, President and CEO of The Bolin Group

10/27/2008
(Original Publish Date: 3/10/2005)

Standardization, once relegated to the domain of engineering, is now the tool of choice in global economic and commerce competition. Engineers used to enjoy the luxury of arguing over each detail, each comma, each shall or may, and spending months or even years creating elegant technical specifications. These specifications were the translation by engineers - of mathematical algorithms into clear, comprehensive, and non-ambiguous natural language (something difficult for even the most skillful writer). In those days, the market moved more slowly, basic computers took up huge rooms, innovation often grew from conception to implementation within an organization's walls, and few outside the circle understood the term standards, at least in a technical sense.