Q&A:

One relatively painless way to improve management's technology quotient is to bring in an expert in one specific area of technology that impacts your business to conduct a monthly brown bag lunch session. The expert can spend 30 minutes talking about the most powerful recent trends in that specific technical area and then ask each executive to provide a two-minute summary of how that technology can potentially solve one of the top three pain points that executive's business unit faces.

The point is not to alleviate pain points at the session itself. Rather, it is to generate ideas by applying the concepts learned and to provide the executive fodder for exploration and education with his technology staff.

Step 3: Make Employees Feel Like They Work For a Tech-Savvy Company.

Forcing traditional BlackBerry use within your company because of its security manageability and workhorse phone status may seem like a good idea--until your competitor releases a custom, internal smartphone app that lets expert staff diagnose and resolve customer issues wherever they are. This means employees can be at their kids' soccer game and solve problems without being the uncool Dad who has to open up a laptop or--worse still--leave the game. This innovation, in turn, impacts customer satisfaction, leading you to find out in Q4 that your competitor has edged you out to win the lion's share of budget for the next fiscal year.