The Internet has transformed our lives in so many ways that it’s almost impossible to keep track of all of the momentous changes. Things that we tend (unfortunately in some cases) to take for granted today would have been thought of as works of magic or astonishing miracles just a decade ago. And no one expects the rate or volume of these changes to slow down any time soon. If anything, the rate of change will continue to accelerate because the growth of our technological capabilities and of our knowledge base is now increasing exponentially in almost every area. It took 13 years to sequence just one percent of the human genome and then just one year thereafter to complete the remaining 99% of the entire DNA process.
So part of our jobs – in addition to adopting, exploiting and incorporating these massive changes into our businesses – is to try to make sense of their broader implications and the impact that they will continue to have on our society as a whole. If everything wants to be free, we still have to figure out what that really means for you and me. And even more importantly what it means for the world we’re building and leaving behind for those who will follow us. If you can’t develop systems that spread and share the amazing benefits and bounties of these technologies to much broader portions of the total population, then the digital revolution will have failed to realize the greatest part of its potential and our own enterprises and adventures will fall far short of the heights that they could have achieved if we had successfully captured the benefits of including all of the human resources which are now efficiently and economically accessible to us in the overall equation. And so it’s incumbent upon all of us to make the extra effort and to reach beyond the easy and the obvious solutions if we’re really going to differentiate our businesses and set ourselves apart from the pack.
If I had to choose the most important difference today in the way that we go about our lives and our businesses, it would be the way that technology (and the mobility and connectivity that it has enabled for all of us) has so radically changed the concept of “place” and the old-fashioned idea that any human endeavor today is location-bound or limited to a single geography or place. We can live virtually anywhere these days and we can work productively from just about everywhere. And we can attract, recruit and employ people with remarkable skills for our companies from all across the world (and also from our own backyards) and, if we don’t, you can be sure that our competition will figure out how to use this abundance of talent for their own benefit.
We, as a country, are very early into this process and, frankly, way too much of the emphasis to date has been on outsourcing and cost savings instead of “insourcing” where we pull these new resources into our businesses and take advantage of their capabilities and brains instead of trying to just save a few bucks on their hourly rates. No one ever saves their way to success. Your own plan for the future needs to be wide enough to build on this world-wide opportunity and also narrow enough to understand that the answers for you could just as readily be next door as in Nairobi. Because stay-at-home Moms, college kids, and people who are smart and willing, but still physically bound to a specific area can all add enormous value to your business. It’s nice to think globally, but you might find your future just as easily at the corner grocery store.
If I had to pick the second most important difference today in the ways that we could (and should) be conducting our businesses and a change, as well, that offers just as many benefits and unexploited opportunities as the newly global and expanded nature of our talent pools, it would be that we need to use the new digital tools and extended connectivity to unlock another vast resource by reaching out to capture the still-vital skills and knowledge of our older citizens – many of whom are technically “retired” or otherwise unwillingly sidelined, but quite far from desiring to be inactive or ceasing to make a continuing and productive contribution to our economy. The fact is that - in our hearts - we never really grow old. We only grow old when our dreams are replaced by regrets. My sense is that growing old is simply something that busy people don’t have time for – whatever their chronological age may be.
Just as gray hair is a sign of age, but not necessarily wisdom; it’s equally true that it’s also in no way reflective of the ongoing value, skill sets, and capabilities (or capacity to work effectively) of millions of our “senior” citizens. And not to simply work – but to work smart. As the classic expression goes: “the young people know the rules; the older folks know the exceptions.” The burden is on us to extend and expand our ideas around where critical work can take place and by whom it can be profitably performed to homes, senior living facilities, remote locations and even retirement and university communities. There’s a reason we like to hire young carpenters, but old physicians. In the next few years, we can convert the old guard into the vanguard of a new push for increasing the utility and productivity of millions of our older, but not old, citizens.
The thought that simple age or a mere lack of digital facility is a disqualification for people with decades of accumulated technical and institutional knowledge, great judgment, and extensive business experience is just another foolish example of wretched excess that we could perhaps afford when we had surplus talent and resources to burn, but which today is a painful oversight that deprives our economy of important incremental sources of skill and intellectual horsepower which are essential as we continue to lose ground in the new global battlefields.
PP YOU GET WHAT YOU WORK FOR, NOT WHAT YOU WISH FOR.
