MEMORIAL MUSINGS.

This being the week of Memorial Day, it got me to thinking about history, and how the world has changed drastically in some ways, yet not changed much in others. ?

Would you agree that the pace of change has suddenly sped up over the past five years, and many of the changes are things we could never have imagined a decade or two ago? Yet, in other ways, things seem to have come full circle around to how they used to be long ago.

Here are a few examples of some ‘new’ changes:

• The mainstream emergence of AI which is now being used by a quickly growing number of people and organizations. Could you have imagined a decade ago that there would be a way to have an artificial intelligence create everything from visual to written art, be an assistant to handle routine work and deliver a synopsis of the world’s published knowledge with a few keystrokes?
• The controversial implanting of a chip in a human’s brain to help them overcome physical challenges.
• The growing awareness that organizations need to be concerned with nurturing both the environment and the people who work for them.
• That profit is not the only criteria for success

And those are just a few of the incredible new things that have become mainstream relatively recently.

Here are a few of things that have changed, but, perhaps for some of them, ‘changed back’ is a better way of saying it:

- More people in the workforce are now self-employed than have been for decades. In the centuries leading up to the Industrial Revolution, most people were self-employed in one or another capacity. Whether it was as a commercial entrepreneur, artisan, craftsperson, small business owner, manual laborer, or other field. There were very few big corporate employers. Today’s circumstances have made it not only essential, but also desirable for many to branch out on their own, just as their forefathers did centuries ago.

• For those who are currently employed by an organization, there is a growing expectation of being treated with consideration, respect and empathy, rather than as a ‘cog’ in the business wheel.
• The old ‘command and control’ leadership style has been proven to be counterproductive and is fast being replaced by human-centric, socially conscious leadership.
• Collaborative work is being seen as far more effective than individual effort, no matter how skilled.
• Employers are now, in some cases, considering attitude and aptitude to be superior to academic qualifications. They’re saying that skills can be taught, but attitude and aptitude are more difficult to acquire if not already part of a person’s mindset.
• We can now handle our workday digitally, in one workspace, or Digital Work Hub, eliminating many of the clunky tools we’ve used online for years.

It’s kind of ‘back to the future’ with simplicity and life-work balance as a priority. These are just a few examples of what’s changed in our world over the past five years. What examples could you add to this? Let’s see how we can expand on the topic in the comments!

#ChangeManagement #WorkManagement