The world is full of surprises, and we feel it more than ever. In her TED talk, Margaret Heffernan discusses the value of our human skills in an unpredictable world, highlighting some practices that can help us better prepare to deal with the uncertainty of the future.
Deal with the unexpected
Margaret Heffernan is an entrepreneur, former CEO of 5 businesses, writer and expert on business and leadership topics. In her TED talk, she laid out the valuable human skills we should cultivate in an unpredictable world.
Efficiency versus surprise
‘ Very small changes can make a big impact. ‘
With the increasing complexity of the world, ‘surprises are becoming natural’. Experts have become reluctant to predict long-term outcomes or specifics. We can predict an accident, but not why or when. We can predict an epidemic, but not when or what.
(Now that we’ve found out…)
Digital transformation has been standardizing work in ways designed for maximum efficiency. However, Heffernan argues, continued effectiveness is lost when the unexpected occurs. In fact, it can limit our ability to adapt and react.
Preparation
In the unpredictable world we live in, Heffernan is a case in point of effective preparedness. This applies to everything from disease prevention, climate change response, financial system security, and more.
For example, some advanced countries have been working on many potential sustainable solutions, such as more forms of renewable energy, as well as improving their water and food supply and healthcare systems. surname. Today, some of these solutions may not work and some innovations may not be used anymore. But they are important, because later it may be too late to prepare.
Many countries take the same approach when it comes to international trade: ‘ Instead of depending on a single giant trading partner, they try to be everyone’s friend because they know they are unpredictable. Which market can suddenly become unstable’.
Experiment
To start changing structures and organizations caught up in the efficiency myth, Heffernan suggests experimenting.
In the Netherlands, a home care nurse proposed a trial. The work is extremely standardized and regulated, so he suggests letting nurses decide how to do their job, since every patient is different. The experiment has been a great success in terms of the time it takes for patients to recover from the disease, as well as reducing costs. He then tried to apply the same approach to the fire service, but the test was unsuccessful.
‘Failed tests don’t look good, but they’re often the only way you can figure out how the real world works. ‘
The CEO of tech company Verve also ran an experiment: ‘Love Week’, a week where employees get to celebrate the clever and imaginative things their co-workers do. A week of distractions may seem unproductive right now, but it energizes the business and improves productivity in the long run.
People skills in the world of technology
‘ The less we know about the future, the more we will need huge, messy, unpredictable sources of human skill. ‘
Heffernan argues that our growing reliance on technology is leading to a decline in our most important people skills, making us more vulnerable and less able to cope with complexity of the world. ‘The more we let machines think for us, the less we think for ourselves’.
The experiments outlined above have highlighted the positive outcomes that can sometimes come from shifting away from technology-based efficiency and more towards people skills and the impact of human relationships. People together.
So what are the people skills we need? All of them: imagination, exploration, creativity, bravery, compassion, nurturing human interactions and relationships.
‘Lost those skills, and we lost our way. But cultivating and developing them, we can create any future we choose.’
How Heffernan’s Talk Can Help Us
Heffernan spoke to her in 2019, and just a few months later, we’re not only witnessing, but truly feeling the unpredictability of the world in ways we haven’t had until now. hour. One thing is to know the world is unpredictable, and another is to live through a period where our lives seem to change drastically from one moment to the next.
Efficiency versus readiness
Less than a year ago, Heffernan made both predictions of an epidemic and economic crises. Experts have been warning us of the dangers of pandemics for decades, having identified a variety of conditions that can facilitate the growth of new pathogens. However, governments were not prepared and…
No one has seen any preparations till now.
Heffernan makes excellent arguments for shifting the balance between effectiveness and preparation in favor of the latter. Not that efficiency is unimportant. But sometimes it can get in the way of actions that help us better prepare for a crisis.
But moving away from the topic of pandemics and government policies, what about scaling towards our own life preparedness? how do we do it now? By cultivating human skills, we can be more adaptive.
The century has been all about efficiency and productivity, not only at work, not just institutionally, but in our personal lives as well. We are all running, trying to be more and more productive, to get more done.
However, with the global pause, our personal lives also slow down. Efficiency in our personal lives now seems a little less meaningful. We may not even be motivated to do much beyond what we have to.
Maybe it’s the perfect time to start thinking about honing our human skills.
Technology
Heffernan takes a stand against the overuse and reliance on technology. However, we can agree that digital tools have a multitude of pros and cons. We’re not in the midst of a pandemic as Heffernan spoke to her, but more than ever, we’re relying on technology tools to work from home and stay connected with our loved ones.
Does video calling replace face-to-face interaction in a satisfying way? Are you sure . However, we are certainly delighted to have this choice, while we cannot meet in person.
We should recognize the value of face-to-face interaction for cultivating human relationships, as well as the undeniable value of the people skills Heffernan emphasizes. Technology should not replace these. But it can help us in many aspects of our lives.
Finding balance is key. Let technology complement us, not take away our human skills.
Preparation, alliance building, imagination, experimentation, fortitude — in an unpredictable age, these are great sources of strength and resilience. They are inefficient, but they provide us with limitless possibilities to adapt, transform, and invent.
Margaret Heffernan
