Business Agility

Business Agility in a World of Artificial Intelligence

augustin — Thu, 19 Jul 2018 08:42:11 +0000

Business Agility in a World of Artificial Intelligence augustin Thu, 07/19/2018 - 10:42

Business Agility, the only remedy to the challenge of the turbulence created by artificial intelligence, automation and your ability to remain employed. Alarmist? Maybe. Worth preparing for? Absolutely!

The following is an article I recently published on Ezine.

“The automation of factories has already decimated jobs in traditional manufacturing, and the rise of artificial intelligence is likely to extend this destruction deep into the middle classes, with only the most intelligent, caring and supervisory roles remaining.” Stephen Hawking.

It doesn’t take one of the world’s greatest living astrophysicists to understand there is a major shift going on in not only our workplaces, but in our society as a whole. The difference between what humans can do and what machines and computers are capable of is shifting, and at an accelerating rate. This reality becomes truly scary to those who currently earn a living by doing repetitive tasks or thinking in repeatable patterns; in other words, most of us.

If you are not able to distinguish what you do from that of a machine or a computer, then how can you really call yourself much more than a human doing? To remain a human being requires more!

The difference between a human doing and a human being?

Your ability to feel and relate.

Going forward, this will be most obvious in those roles that as Professor Hawking reminds us require feelings, leadership and creativity combined with intelligence. For the foreseeable future, this means that your economy will increasingly be influenced by your ability to listen, understand, empathize, create and lead. In short, the more you cultivate your ability to consciously feel, powerfully communicate and relate, the better chance you will have of getting paid. Transacting can be left to our increasingly sophisticated creations.

Even if increasing your ability to use your senses to relate is reduced down to the economics of being employed or not, just that is a positive start! Most of us are now being forced to learn that trying to compete with computers and machines only leads to increased stress and ultimately dis-ease.

“Life in a Spreadsheet”

A good friend, Tim Finucane, came up with this appropriate metaphor over ten years ago, and it rings truer today than when he first coined it. Since the advent of Lotus 1-2-3 and Microsoft Excel, 30 plus years ago, we have been able to measure job performance with increasing accuracy as well as more intrusiveness. Whereas, spreadsheets were first used to help us perform better, they have now morphed into being used to dictate and monitor increasingly challenging performance metrics. Is it any wonder that each little box in a spreadsheet is called a “cell”? Just like prison, these cells keep getting smaller and just like government budgets, each metric usually increases over time.

Spreadsheet technology gave way to the idea of Key Performance Indicators or KPIs. For your company, these are metrics based almost entirely upon historical performance, yet are prone to increase or tighten every time they are reviewed. This is fine for a machine that you can tweak and improve with newer technology, but when the key components are you and your co-worker, constant increases can stifle your creativity and crush your ability to care. The machine literally drains you of your humanity and what are human beings without that?

Powerful forces, problem or Agile Opportunity?

Thus we have two powerful forces working against us. Firstly, constantly increasing performance metrics keep limiting our ability to be human. Secondly, increasingly efficient computers and machines make obsolete more of our opportunities to earn. The good news is that those who understand these powerful forces and the change they are bringing can begin directly to increase their creativity, as well as hone their ability to sense, relate and lead.

What if this measurement trend also is forcing us to take more personal responsibility to relearn and improve the skills necessary for not just emotional, but social competence? Don’t think this is important? One of the seminars held at this year’s Davos World Economic Forum was titled, “Maintaining Your Humanity”. Even the Elites now get it.

Competing with an increasingly sophisticated computer or machine for jobs that technology can do better is not a winning strategy! Especially if you wish to remain healthy and prosperous. The one area that for the foreseeable future will remain the domain of humans is where feelings and relationships come into play. These areas include but are not limited to:

Customer Service
Healthcare
Sales
Leadership
Music and arts

Each one of these areas of human endeavor requires feeling and sensitivity to succeed. Computers and machines cannot do that. Machines can measure and they can perform without rest, but they cannot not feel anything while performing or when they objectively measure and communicate the results. This job is left for us to interpret and enjoy, or not.

Conclusion: Remain Human, Get Agile, or Be Swallowed by the Technology

If you want to insure your ability to earn a living going forward, you need to begin now to optimize your use of computer and machine skills, while simultaneously rediscovering and mastering your ability to be vibrant human being. Missing this opportunity may not affect you tomorrow, but sooner or later the Technologically Weighted Future we are all tumbling into will catch up to even you!

Please visit our new http://www.masteringagilityblog.com website and get the latest news on business agility. You can also download your own complementary copy of the Introduction to the book, “Mastering Agility, Successfully Navigating Uncertainty*.

My co-Author, Hans Amell on Business Agility

Published on

Tue, 14-02-2017

Agility! Power in Mastering Business Agility

augustin — Thu, 19 Jul 2018 12:18:27 +0000

Agility! Power in Mastering Business Agility augustin Thu, 07/19/2018 - 14:18

Mastering Business Agility, Your Lifestyle!

Is the phrase, “Mastering business agility”, powerful and urgent enough for you? Does it get you to actually grasp how crucial to your success practicing business agility is becoming? The biggest concern when naming our new book was the conscious use of the word, “Mastering“. Although the word mastery is perceived as more of a, squishy, “soft skill” term, what if the warmth and fuzziness of mastering something belies its power and usefulness?

Business Agility will be the key for survival and profit!

With the powerful megatrends that are currently in motion such as: big data, aging demographics and easy money, to name just a few, plus the perfect storm of economical, geopolitical and environmental chaos are uniting to cause business cycles to shorten and intensify, Drastically. To avoid being on the wrong side of any of these threats and possibilities, it now requires a dramatic increase in your conscious use of business agility. To reach and maintain a heightened sense of business agility, you are encouraged to join us on the road to its mastery.

Mastery is a lifestyle, a path.

Mastery keeps you on the path of being open to learning and improving whatever you choose to master. This path to Mastery has many properties and qualities. Many of them are already covered in our book. One other noteworthy property you will find on your journey is that mastery slows down time! Think about it. If most of us ever got the chance to play tennis with a master, for instance a Connors, Borg or Agazzi, responding effectively to their serves would be next to impossible. By the time you even noticed them, their serves would already be sizzling past you. Game over! Yet, put two of these pros on the court together and they can respond to their opponent’s serve, often with time to spare. Why? Because their training and attention to detail has allowed them to expand time. They can perceive the oncoming serve as traveling slower than we do. They can then cooly and consciously respond to the ball in an agile and masterful way. This is agility! The more you consciously practice being agile, the more time you too will have to master its process and create healthy, enjoyable and sustainable business success.

Everything seems to be speeding up

Have you noticed that the older we get, the faster time seems to “fly” past? Business, technology, weather, political and environmental cycles are hitting harder and more frequently, pushing more of us off-balance. These factors are causing us all more stress and dis-ease. This trend looks set to continue and intensify even more.

The danger of Expertise

In such a turbulent environment, fooling yourself into thinking that you are an expert and that you know exactly what to do is a recipe for disaster. Sooner or later, the gap between your expertise and pride disappears. Resting on your laurels or hoping to glide into retirement on what you did are rapidly becoming useless anachronisms. They will only slow you down! Eventually, experts get sloppy, often arrogant and thus lose their edge. That’s the nature of the beast. Often it becomes worse, as many experts try to defend their expertise and the institution that sponsors them. They miss the handwriting on the wall of change. This is not just a cliché! Ask anyone laid off from Nokia or Motorola about how defending business as usual turned out for them.

No room for mastery there.

Mastery also includes a dimension of presence not found in being an expert.

There is a humility, a fresh sense of childish curiosity and a sense of presence and wonder that will temper and balance your years of hard-earned experience. How can being present and curious contribute to master’s ability to slow down time?

Think of how quickly an expert goes into comparison or explanation mode. They see a situation and begin cataloguing and comparing it as in, “just like that time when… ” Done, next issue. Yet, what if, for instance, your new situation:

Includes a twist that didn’t even exist last time?
Happens harder and faster than last time?
Was solved by people or ideas that have been forgotten or misplaced?
The combination of events happens in a different sequence or different doses?
The events are just misinterpreted?

Just as you can never step into the same river twice, it borders on arrogance to believe you can predict a future outcome just based upon a past experience. As Mark Twain once said, “History may not repeat, but it sure does rhyme” and this is where mastery is so much more powerful than expertise. Mastery propels your expertise into decisive and confident action, in present time! This allows you more room to dance with and resolve the issue before you, here and now. You can now use your expertise, yet with more desperately needed agility. Your expertise now becomes one more of your many business tools and you are no longer limited by it‘s rules. You can now develop your knowledge into a new dimension. The reason you can has to do with…

Mastering Business Agility means Service!

Practicing mastery compels you to use your expertise to serve others. It allows you to develop it further, together, rather than just craving the spotlight for personal recognition, fame and fortune. A master invites everyone interested onto his/her path, rather than selfishly keeping it hidden or guarded. To do this requires massive amounts of curiosity, openness and a willingness to serve others. You will also continue to learn even more yourself. What better way is there to develop agility as a lifestyle than by choosing the path of Mastery?

Therefore, when we say it is important to master business agility, we mean it literally and categorically. To be curious, vigilant and to use your expertise, in a way that both benefits and develops others, is a strong start on your path to mastery. To be open, quick and focused on the horizon, rather than the past, will support and encourage you further on your journey to business agility mastery.

If you understand and agree with the critical need to get agile now and are looking for proven tools to use, please click on the following link.

“Mastering Agility, Successfully Navigating Uncertainty” available on Amazon.

Published on

Thu, 03-11-2016