By Francis J. Kong
(The Philippine Star)
Updated December 04, 2011
The world today is inter-connected as never before.
Greece’s financial troubles brought stocks all over the world
tumbling. America’s recession affected and continues to affect global
economic outlook. There really is no hiding from this fact anymore.
The world has become so inter-woven that geographical distance is no longer a factor. The person taking orders at a drive-in
fast-food chain in California is actually being handled by someone in
Bangalore. The nice-sounding, friendly and polite tech support servicing
a client in Iowa may just turn out to be a Filipino manning a computer
somewhere in Clark or Eastwood.
This is our world today. Famous British speaker and author Sir Ken
Robinsons described how complicated being British is these days. He said
that being British these days means driving home in a German-engineered
car, stopping to get some Irish beer or Danish lager, picking up Indian
curry or Greek kebab and spending the evening sitting on Swedish
furniture watching American programs on a Japanese TV. And the most vicious of all? Suspicion of anything foreign.
Things in our world are really becoming more and more complicated.
And it takes a different kind of mindset and outlook to be able to
navigate in the world we are in today.
Last year, IBM looked at 3,000 CEOs around the world and asked them
what they thought is the biggest challenge they face in running their
businesses. The first thing they said was complexity.
So how do you deal with complexity since the world is getting more and more complicated?
I have said this again and again: Our educational degree, the
pedigree we acquire having graduated from whichever university – these
things do not matter much anymore in how business is done these days.
What matters these days is learning agility: the ability to learn,
relearn and unlearn.
Ideas are the currency of the future. We are now entering the age of
creativity, and those who will succeed are those who are creative and
who know how to do their work right. Do not conclude that successful
people have just been lucky. These people have worked hard and learned
continuously, so that when opportunities knocked on their doors, they
were ready to seize them.
But learning agility alone is not enough to make one successful.
Another crucial element is the ability to work with love and passion.
The norm today is simple: If you don’t love your work, there will always
be someone who would, and you may just end up being replaced.
Successful people love their work. They are perceived to be born with
a natural aptitude. They are people who work within their element. And
as I interview successful people, they seem to say this same thing:
“This is not my work, this is who I am.” Successful people do their work
well, love their work, and consider their work as part of who they are.
Compare this with people who whine, and moan and groan, and complain
about how stupid their job is and that they are just in it for the money they need to pay off their debts.
The world is getting more and more complex by the day. Just thinking
about the paycheck all the time, while doing bit of Facebook on the side
and going on prolonged coffee breaks, will not prepare you for more
future complexities. Work
will increasingly change. Jobs will be harder to find. Technology after
technology will be developed, and alter the way we live, the way we
work and the way we think.
He who knows he needs to know more is the one who will succeed. He
who thinks he already knows much will fail in this new world of
complexities. Pride and a haughty spirit come before destruction, and he
who humbles himself God will exalt. This is so true no matter the
complexities.
Learn to live and live to learn. This is not complex, it’s as simple as it can be.
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