“From North Korean missiles to the eclipse to fidget spinners, 2017 was a year so surreal, so densely populated with strange and alarming events, that you have to seriously consider the possibility that somebody — and when we say “somebody,” we mean “Russia” — was putting LSD in our water supply.”
The above quote is from Dave Barry in a cover page article in today’s (12/31/17) Washington Post. He’s captured the zeitgeist or spirit of the times in the above quotation.
THE CHALLENGE
This year we wrote a piece on Moose Lodges. They were a once famous organization, where folks would gather, share thoughts of the world, and do good things for the community. In other words, it was a meeting place of like minded folks with common interests. But, times changed. More folks now use social media as their virtual meeting place to discover common interests.
Moose Lodge is a metaphor or syndrome for organizations that don’t adapt to VUCA (Volatility, Uncertainty, Complexity, Ambiguity) change.
Moose Lodge is also a syndrome for people. We are all human. We want to be liked. We have to share. We want to do good things. We want a good to great reputation.
And, we don’t want to change. We want things to stay the same. We don’t want to expend energies or time that don’t provide immediate gratification. We often take the path of least resistance, much like an electrical circuit.
But, is this the right path for us, when 40% or more jobs will fundamentally change due to artificial intelligence and machine learning?
What will help organizations and folks is to have a template on how to sustain, adapt, and even transform. The challenge is there are no gurus or workbooks on how to transform in a VUCA world.
OUR SOLUTIONS
A common refrain this year (2017) in our CERM Risk News and CERM Risk Insights has been we live in VUCA (Volatility, Uncertainty, Complexity, Ambiguity) time in a VUCA world. The challenge is our organizations and management are not ready. They are living large on the old paradigm.
The fear is distilled in this NY Times piece:
“In much of the world, people whose livelihoods depend on paychecks are increasingly anxious about a potential wave of unemployment threatened by automation. As the frightening tale goes, globalization forced people in wealthier lands like North America and Europe to compete directly with cheaper laborers in Asia and Latin America, sowing joblessness. Now, the robots are coming to finish off the humans.”[i]
In 2018, we’re going to focus more on how VUCA is disrupting work, careers and jobs. We call this workstyle. We are updating our book: Working It: The Rules Have Changed. We will have more blog posts and video’s (WorkingIt.com and WorkingIt.TV) on the changing nature of work. We will have more machine learning and artificial intelligence based on risk based, decision making and deciding how to decide.
We look forward to hearing your thoughts on our new products:
- Working It™ News.
- Working It™ Insights.
- AI and Machine Learning™ News
- Deciding How to Decide™
May we wish all of you a joyous and Happy New Year.
[i] ‘The Robots Are Coming, and Sweden Is Fine, NY Times, December 27, 2017.
Bio:
Greg Hutchins PE and CERM (503.233.101 & GregH@QualityPlusEngineering.com) is the founder of:
CERMAcademy.com
800Compete.com
QualityPlusEngineering.com
WorkingIt.com
He is the evangelist behind Future of Quality: Risk®. He is currently working on the Future of Work and machine learning projects.
He is a frequent speaker and expert on Supply Chain Risk Management and cyber security. His current books available on all platform are shown below:
