Change is here to stay

I woke up this morning, to the following quote from marketing guru Seth Godin:

It’s possible that you no longer need to get better at your craft. That your craft is just fine. It’s possible that you need to be braver instead.

It immediately hit home what friends, family and colleagues have been telling me for a long time. I don’t need to take another course to get better at what I do. I just need to do it.

It also struck me how this is inextricably linked to a movement I’m involved in called REINVENTION. Given that my main topic of interest is CHANGE – how change affects us, how we manage it, what we can do to thrive in times of change, I was immediately drawn to the concept of reinvention.

What is REINVENTION? Reinvention is about change. It’s about understanding that change is here to stay. It’s based on two very basic ideas. The first is about the speed of change and how that has increased over the years; and the second is to ask ourselves, are we prepared for change. Nadya Zhexembayeva, the founder of the Reinvention movement, has written extensively and talked a great deal about the need to reinvent, whether it is for yourself or for your organization. You can listen to one of Nadya’s TEDx talks here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8VJjD8JnAYQ&t=1s

To get back to Seth Godin, what does bravery have to do with it?

It takes courage to realize, understand, accept and embrace the fact that change is here to stay. I would go so far as to say that change is now part of our DNA. As human beings we are hard-wired to be averse to change. We fight it or we run away from it. In today’s world, this no longer works. Be it in business or for your own personal development, the pervasive nature of change forces us to reinvent ourselves continuously. In other words, our continued existence depends on our ability to reinvent. Reinvention is today’s version of Darwinian law.

Change is not a dirty word. In fact, I believe that change is bad only if you are not prepared for it. In a very recent article by Gallup entitled The Future of Work Means Managing Through Disruption, the authors state: “If employees are accustomed to a culture of change, they are less likely to feel threatened or overwhelmed when new initiatives require them to adapt.”

You can read the whole article here: https://www.gallup.com/workplace/266870/future-work-means-managing-disruption.aspx

As a speaker about CHANGE, I quickly became a fan of REINVENTION after doing some research into how leaders and employees view change and after having read a lot of research from Gallup, McKinsey and others.

In the words of Nadya Zhexembayeva, REINVENTION is:

“An opportunity to develop a new version of yourself. A new version of your team. A new version of your company. And perhaps, one day, a new version of our world. The most exciting thing is what’s ahead, what you decide to do with it.

Change is not a punishment. Change is not out to get you or destroy you. Change is not an accident and it’s not ever going to go back to business as usual. Change is not a bug. It’s a feature. It’s part of our global new world and you have an option. Ride the waves of change or get crushed by them.

When you choose to take change and turn it into opportunity, you earn the right to become a better version of yourself.”

I could not have said it better.

Don’t just try to get better at your craft. Be brave enough to ask yourself if your craft is up to the challenge. What are the ways (even very small ways) you can answer the changing needs of your customers, your suppliers, your readers, yourself, your family, your team, your organization, the world?

I invite you to watch this video of a song by Sam Cooke, called A Change is Gonna Come. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wEBlaMOmKV4&list=RDwEBlaMOmKV4&start_radio=1&t=189

Sam Cooke was perhaps ahead of his time. Today, change is not just gonna come… Change is here. And it’s here to stay.