The More Things Change….
Shuffling through moldering overheads, I found an old presentation I used to do called, “Strategies for Reinventing Yourself.” It began with a recitation from perennial management guru, Tom Peters. I’ve lost the citation, I’m afraid, but since this is ancient history, circa 1993, it probably came from a book, speech or article of his around the time of Re-Imagine! Business Excellence in a Disruptive Age. Whether or not you are a fan of Peters, listen to this:
“We are coping with the biggest economic change in two centuries. That’s self-evident. But what does it mean?”
“It means that to be scared out of one’s wits is sensible. To be certain of anything is suicidal….”
“1. Don’t worry if you’re feeling nuts. In fact, worry if you are not. There are no certain answers. We don’t even know what questions to ask.”
“2. Don’t even think of hiding. There’s no such thing as insurance against bicentennial change. Overall, Americans’ increasing demands to be protected against any and all untoward events amounts to an enormous drag on our ability to adapt to this tectonic shift.”
“3. Reinvent yourself. Corporations and government must be transformed. And so must you and I. The race will go to the curious, the slightly mad, those with an unsated passion for learning and daredeviltry.”
“4. Remind yourself that you’re in the midst of something really big. Maybe that, in and of itself, will make us a little more receptive to the next cataclysmic disruption that will surely come our way.”
I had to smile. I guess we’ve been with this longer than I thought. Plus ça change, plus la même chose.
Technorati Tag: Transformation
Posted: April 1st, 2009 under Transformation.
Comments: 6
Trackback: http://www.unfoldingleadership.com/blog/wp-trackback.php?p=575
Permalink: http://www.unfoldingleadership.com/blog/?p=575
Comments
Comment from Dick Richards
Time: April 1, 2009, 3:43 pm
Gosh. Thanks for the reminder. I suppose we have encountered “the next cataclysmic disruption.”
Comment from Joe McCarthy
Time: April 2, 2009, 7:52 am
Inspiring insights (!), but perhaps not as ancient as you imagine. His Re-imagine! book came out in 2003, but that was still well before most of us were imagining the current cataclysmic disruptions.
My favorite example of change [not] was on the not-so-recent topic of information overload, shared by Paul Dourish at the CSCW 2006 conference:
One of the diseases of this age is the multiplicity of books; they doth so overcharge the world that it is not able to digest the abundance of idle matter that is every day hatched and brought forth into the world.
— Barnaby Rich (1580-1617), writing in 1613 (!); quoted by de Solla Price in his 1963 book “Little Science, Big Science.”
Comment from Dan
Time: April 2, 2009, 8:10 am
Joe, thanks for the correction. My googling did not reveal a source for the exact words from Peters I’ve listed above, but I’m sure they are from Sept, 1993, not 2003. You are right that Re-Imagine! must not be the source. Loved the quotation from Barnaby Rich.
Dick, thanks for stopping by. I agree with you.
Comment from Mary Allison
Time: April 2, 2009, 8:14 am
Nice work on perspective Dan. And Joe – thanks for the Rich quote. It is hard to measure what is “good” when all is abundant. Reminds me that I must listen to my heart to know what it good for me.
Comment from Joe McCarthy
Time: April 2, 2009, 12:53 pm
Found it! [Via googling for "unsated passion for learning and daredeviltry"]:
A Very Big Deal Indeed
Posted on September 03, 1993.
Mary: I like the way you expressed your view on goodness and abundance. My take on it – not sure if that’s what you intended – is that “if everything is ‘good’, it’s all background noise”. Indeed, I suppose it could be argued that scarcity is what creates [relative] value. I’ve been [re]thinking about abundance and scarcity amid the growing recession. Found a recent, interesting article on The Psychology of Abundance and Scarcity:
Just as the aftermath of World War II required a burst of creativity resulting in new structures, processes, and organizations that have helped order international economics and politics, the current crisis offers unmatched opportunity to redress excess and moderate the psychology of abundance with a dose of the psychology of scarcity. What is needed is a blending of eternal American optimism, vigor and action with European longer-term perspective and structured process, a balance between the psychologies of abundance and of scarcity.
Comment from Dan
Time: April 2, 2009, 11:38 pm
Joe
Wow! Thank you! You are a masterful googler — at least more masterful than me.
Mary, thanks for your comment, too. My own two cents is that what’s getting corrected right now is not abundance but excess. And while scarcity may play a positive role to some extent in the correction, my preferred direction is to redefine what we mean by abundance to be something closer to “sufficient.” As I understand it, the original meaning of the word, abundant, was something like “overflowing,” which by nature suggests excess, while the root of sufficient is more like “meeting the need of.” Abundance and scarcity represent polar ends of a spectrum, smacking of Western either/or thinking. Sufficient, to me, sounds closer to a natural state.
Write a comment