Change remains one of the three constants in life (taxes and death being the other two). Change has been accelerating in the recent years, all as a result of what I call the ‘Columbus Effect’ and the ‘Kennedy Effect’. Let me explain…
The ‘Columbus Effect’ is a result of Columbus discovering the Americas – or at least what he takes credit for, when we all know the Indigenous Peoples discovered the Americas 5,000+ years before him (he is also the one that famously enslaved thousands of the aforementioned Indigenous people and nearly wiped-out entire tribes with smallpox). That ugliness aside, his 1492 voyage changed everything, and kicked off the ‘Age of Discovery’. To name a few of the massive changes from 1500 to the 20th Century… Landline communications, powered manned flight, and the automobile.
The ’Kennedy Effect’ is the big one though. In May of 1961, John F. Kennedy stood in front of Congress and said (and I paraphrase); “By the end of this decade, we will put a man on the moon and bring him safely home to earth again.” Kennedy’s real vision was to get Americans back into higher education and technical schools because he feared the Russians were winning the Nuclear Race. The so-called ‘Moon Shot’ vision was a much more meaningful and memorable challenge he hoped Americans would accept and push the country toward technical supremacy. It worked. The Moon Vision got people back into higher education and technical programs. Today’s Silicon Valley is a result of that vision. Computers, GPS navigation, digital everything, microwave ovens, cell phones, and the list goes on is a direct result of the thousands of engineers from 100,000 companies that were involved in developing the Apollo Moon program.
What does this have to do with needing to embrace change today?
Good question.
We are sitting at around eight billion people on the planet. When Kennedy laid out his Moon Vision in 1961, there were only three billion people on the planet. We have added five billion in a mere 60 years.
Today’s Intel Core-9 processor in your laptop can solve a problem in about three minutes that early mainframe computers would have taken 30-years to solve. A quantum computer can solve in seconds a problem that your Intel Core-9 processor would take 30-yerars to solve.
Change is accelerating.
As a leader, developing a ‘Change Mindset’ is paramount. Blockbuster is dead because they didn’t change (even when Netflix went to Blockbuster asking them to purchase Netflix because they needed cash to develop their streaming idea). Kodak is dead even though they owned the patent for digital photography, and they let it expire.
You and your team have to make sure they are the ‘disruptors’ in your industry. Be it the firm that figures out to deliver they very best quality, to be the most efficient, the most innovative or the very best in service. Be on top or risk being passed by. And then figure out how to do it again and again.
Change is not a one-time thing. It is an everyday thing.
If you find yourself saying you are “tired of constant change”, you will find yourself irrelevant as a leader.
As a leader, help your team understand that the world is not going to slow down and we need to embrace change or be changed by external forces.
