Tech marketers talk constantly about the need to reach “C-level” executives. But that is such a simplistic view of technology adoption. Sure, the CIO is important, but real technology change almost always begins lower in the organization. CIOs are some of the most risk-averse people on the planet. So why are marketers going to CIOs to try to effect change in the organization?

I put together an off-the-top-of-my-head list of disruptive technologies that have been introduced in the last 20 years without the involvement of IT management. It’s long and I’m sure I’ve missed a few.

Disruptive technology – that which changes the way we do things – is never introduced at the top of an organization. It almost always comes in through the back door. In fact, I can think of only a couple of game-changing technologies that were driven by top IT management: routers and VoIP switches.

Here’s my list of mainstream technologies that were successful in spite of opposition by IT management. Tell me what I missed.

• PCs
• Word processing software
• Spreadsheets
• Personal faxes
• Personal printers
• LANs
• Unix workstations (which drove Unix adoption on the server)
• GUIs
• Presentation graphics
• Cell phones
• The Internet
• PDAs
• Instant messaging
• Net conferencing
• Streaming audio/video
• Open source/Linux
• Peer-to-peer networks
• Wireless LANs