Digital maturity Vs Tool fetishism
- Danil
- Oct 1
- 2 min read
I’ve always been curious about where the line lies between digital maturity and tool fetishism.
In the projects and organizations I’ve worked with, we’ve regularly introduced new tools and sometimes out of necessity, sometimes as part of a broader strategy. Still, every now and then (thankfully, not too often → credit to the teams), I’d hear: “Another tool? Again? He’s obsessed with tools.”
For me, the distinction is fairly simple:
Digital maturity is a process of growing alignment between tech, people, and purpose.
Tool fetishism is a dead end and a false performance of progress.
Signs of Digital Maturity
Technology supports goals. It doesn’t dictate direction.
Culture of learning and adaptation. New tools are adopted through team engagement and support, not dropped with a tutorial link and hope.
Stable, repeatable processes. Work doesn’t collapse when one person is away. Knowledge isn’t trapped in someone’s head. It’s distributed, shared, and sustainable.
Knowledge is managed and accessible. Everyone knows where to find things. Information lives longer than a Teams chat. What’s created is stored, shared, and built upon.
Decisions are based on data and observation. Not “that’s how we’ve always done it,” but “that’s what the evidence shows.”
Integrated tools and workflows. Systems talk to each other: no duplicate work, no isolated platforms. Tools function together, not just coexist.
Signs of Tool Fetishism
Tech FOMO. Tools are adopted out of fear of missing out: “Everyone’s using it, we should too.”
Constant tool-hopping. One month it’s Google Forms, then Typeform, and then Airtable Forms, but no one knows where the data lives.
Interface over impact (it’s all polished and smooth in our age of perfect UX, after all!)
Ignoring the team's digital capacity.
No implementation, just installation. A tool gets introduced, but there’s no onboarding, adoption strategy, iteration, or support.
I belie tool fetishism isn’t always intentional. It’s a symptom that can show up even on the path toward digital maturity. And I feel it myself from time to time.
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