This week's session in TWC was one of nervousness and significance all at the same time. Nervousness primarily due to the fact that it was my turn to present my individual topic in class. But that anxiety was short-lived, thankfully. And the rest of the session was rather insightful and applicable to what I've experienced in life so far.
One of the main ideas that perked out at me during the session was the difference between evolutionary change and revolutionary change. This clear distinction between the two changes was something I never really thought about. To me, change was simply just change. Sometimes, it was a big change, sometimes it was a small change. And categorizing something like change as evolutionary and revolutionary made sense but was never really something I considered deeply. Evolutionary change was change that was created essentially from adaptation. By continuously making changes and adapting to a specific situation, condition or requirement, evolutionary change is born. Evolutionary change was more of a process than an overnight occurrence. Also born from change, was the idea of revolutionary change. This child of change was the rebel; he was the smart, strong-headed and sometimes, radical one. Often looking for ways to trump everyone else in whatever he did and also keeping an eye out for trying to change the game so that he would be remembered as someone great - the spark of a revolution. The unique thing that caught me was that these two were not exclusive, meaning an evolutionary change could eventually turn into a revolutionary change considering the scale of the change and the way it affected the world or the industry etc. If an evolutionary change has adapted and evolved to the point where it surpasses all norms and changes the way things are done in the future, then it will be considered as revolutionary, no?
An interesting take-away I got from this session is the quote by Deming -“It is not necessary to change. Survival is not mandatory”. I found this provocatively humorous as it uses dry sarcasm to get a point across. However, the point is one of paramount importance since survival is the key purpose of any species in this universe. And in a reversed, black-humoured kind of way, Deming is saying that change is key in ensuring we continue to survive. I found this idea to be jarringly obvious as evolution in nature which is the biological change of species as a form of adaptation is the reason why these species have survived on till today. Nature has a way to telling us - adapt or die. Prehistoric creatures are prehistoric because they didn't or couldn't change in time, but animals like sharks which evolved from the gigantic Megalodon and other prehistoric water creatures have come to exist in oceans today because of their ability to evolve and adapt. Similarly, us as humans need to be able to adapt to situations, changes in the world and also to other humans in order to continue to thrive.
The table that showed the process of Uninformed optimisim -> informed pessimism -> informed realism -> completion was something I felt truly akin to. During my national service days, a few friends and I started a small web-based clothing line. Our idea was to provide budding local designers fresh out of their colleges with an avenue to showcase their talent and make some money at the same time. We liaised with them to produce their designs to the online market and many of the designers shared our enthusiasm for the project. My team and I definitely went through each and every stage of the table save Completion which was sadly put on hold due to all of us having to go to university to further our studies. The first time the four of us met up and discussed this new business, it was utter optimism and we all felt like we could definitely take this project somewhere. When we took it to the next step and sourced for an affordable manufacturer, continued our market research, approached government bodies for young entrepreneurship grants and started spending capital in making the project a reality, we suddenly realised how difficult it all was to begin this small business. It was informed pessimism at its finest. But as we surged on and devoted more and more of our waking hours into forging the project into existence, we came the informed realism plateau. Sadly, after travelling to Guangzhou, China and finding a manufacturer that was adept and dependable, we had to abandon the project in hopes of achieving a higher education. The plateaus in this table were vividly real to me and they will definitely be present in all forms of entrepreneurship.
Another aspect of this session that struck a chord with me was the article about "Herding Cats". It was interesting for the author to draw parallels between cats and followers and how leaders of the future need to keep in mind that modern followers have their own mindsets, beliefs and values. Essentially, modern day followers, like cats, are often individualistic. As education becomes a mainstay in modern, growingly affluent societies, individuals become more like individuals. They question, ask, and are able to think for themselves. Thus, leaders have to respect that aspect of followers in this day and age in order to be effective in reaching out to them as a leader. Leadership, as a result, has to evolve into a more respect-based system as followers become more skilled and knowledgeable. Gone are the days where the leader is portrayed as the all-knowing and wise figure which followers idolize and follow without question. This evolution of leadership poses new challenges for leaders and the skill sets they need in order to be successful in the modern age. Although I know this has little to do with TWC, a topic of discussion I would have liked to engage with the class in is - what kind of values and what kind of leader will best suit today's world? It feel that it would be interesting to see what the class thinks a leader truly is and maybe we can each pick up a thing or two about leadership as being a leader is something almost anybody will encounter in the future, be it in the household, the workplace or in your future business units.
Personal rating for this session: 7.921/10
Off to further musings,
James G14
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