How Can Organizations Adapt To A Rapidly Changing World?
It’s no secret that change is happening in every organization, across every department and in every geography. I have been traveling consistently over the past few months and this is a topic that organizations all over the world are thinking about. What should companies focus on? People? Technology? Process? The physical workspace? The best way for organizations to think about and prepare for the future of work is actually much less specific. So before thinking about technology, freelancers, or millennials, we need to have a broader mental shift in our minds. The best way for us to think about this, is to look at our organizations less like factories and more like laboratories.
Factories are notorious for being linear and process centric. They focus on command and control and they are very good at maintaining the status quo. That is how our organizations have been structured. You can look at multiple companies and see the same type of employees, managers, technology, cubicles, dress code and commute. There is a very strict format to follow that often yields in the same result. Now, let’s look at laboratories. They experiment, sometimes there are failures but they are able to learn from them and replicate successes in a broader scale. They use data to make informed decisions, and they are continuously experimenting on what works and what doesn’t. That is the model that organizations need to think about in order to survive and thrive. This is the best way to prepare for the future of work in this rapidly changing world. The best thing we can do is to shift our mindsets, attitudes and behaviors to think of our companies like laboratories and less like factories.
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This month’s content on the future of work was made possible by my friends at Work Market. Work Market is a freelance management system that brings freelancers and organizations together. As the freelancer economy continues to grow organizations are going to have to think differently about how they service, innovate, and compete in the future of work.
Jacob is an author, speaker, and futurist. You can learn more by visiting TheFutureOrganization.com. You can also subscribe to Jacob’s newsletter to get weekly content on the future of work and the first 30 pages of his new book, The Future of Work.
