At heart I am a tech guy, since I was four years old I have been fascinated with computers but at some point in the past few years realized that the only being concerned with technology because it was “cool” or interesting wasn’t particularly helpful to the rest of the world.

Recently, I have been fascinated with Apple because of the simplicity and clarity of their products.  They are designed for usability and with the end user in mind.  Usable software is very cool software.

So much business software is designed by tech guys with loose business requirements and without a full understanding of why people do their jobs the way they do.   Business school is helping me to learn and understand the motivation behind the way we do business.

What is particularly difficult for a tech guy in business school is to “forget” the technology and think and write about the business.  I have recently been in an IT for Managers class and even with conscious efforts I still get the occasional “still to technical” comments form the professors.

I have benefited greatly from these critiques  and realizing that the main benefit I have been getting, is not just understanding, but how to communicate.  As Chip Heath points out in “Made to Stick” the “Curse of Knowledge” causes people to forget what it is like to not know something and how difficult it can be to learn and understand the foreign topics.  Business school for techies isn’t just about understanding, its about learning to communicate with the rest of the world.