Message of the Day: Being Adaptable to the Changing Times might have Saved Rome

Good Morning,

 

Currently I am listening to “The Secret of the Ages” by Robert Collier (http://www.amazon.com/Secret-Ages-Robert-Collier/dp/0912576111) and came across an interesting section right up front. Robert Collier asks what the Dinosaurs, Ancient Greece and The Roman Empire have in common.

 

They all are no longer with us…Why?

 

According to Collier, they did not adapt to the changing times around them and were ultimately swept away by the changing world. In other words, they stopped growing or learning and expanding their ability to change with the times.

 

Okay with the Dinosaurs, there was this meteorite thing, but not all of the Dinosaurs died off, only those who could not adapt.

 

We are seeing this same situation in action in our economy today. Like two tectonic plates rubbing against each other, the old and new economies are causing financial earthquakes the world over.

 

The times have changed, and many ‘old school’ businesses and people are fighting tooth and nail to hold onto what they know are comfortable with and fight off adapting to the changing world around them. The harder they fight, the tougher the economic times will be with them when they finally fold.

 

This is nothing new. In the early 1990’s, IBM’s funeral was being planned by such companies as Microsoft and others. The global giant, IBM, lost touch with the current playing field and continued doing business as usual; not listening to customer’s needs, but doing what THEY thought the customer needed. Other smaller companies came in and started eating away at market share and IBM did not even notice nearly half of its market was gone. It took a strong CEO, Louis Gerstner Jr., to turn them around and make them more flexible and adaptable, and he did not have an easy job of it.

 

Apple was in the same boat when Steve Jobs was hired back as CEO. He had to go in and literally change the culture of the company from top to bottom to get it to stop dying. He forced them to change and adapt.

 

We too can become victims of the changing times if we refuse to change and grow. When I was downsized in 2003, I felt I had all I needed to get a new job ASAP. I had experience, I had an Associates Degree, and I had landed my last four jobs on the first interview. It was a rude awakening for me seeing that I was very, very wrong. I had to change and adapt and grow if I wanted to survive. And that is what I did, two college degrees and nearly 300 books later I am in a better, but still not invulnerable position, so I will keep learning and growing myself.

 

We all need to grow and learn and boost our ability to adapt. The world is changing, we cannot stop it, so we better find ways to allow ourselves to embrace the new world or we may be going the way of the Roman Empire and the Dinosaurs.

 

Enjoy!

 

Sanford Berenberg

Sanford@berenberg.net

http://www.berenberg.net

http://sanfordberenberg.blogspot.com/

502-533-9336

 

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