Ownership and access

Everything is in a state of flux. Consider the following: So many young people including the not so young ones are now watching movies through Netflix. Gone are the days when they had to go to shopping centers to buy their original or “pirated” DVD’s which was a perennial pain on the neck of government authorities wanting to put a stop to the illegal trade.

Today is obvious that technology solves the problem. Amazon Kindle Unlimited enables many to read any book in its 300,000 volume library and I do not even have to own a single copy.

I don’t play much videogames but young people are now telling me that they can play games through PlayStation now without purchasing any of the games they play. And so, it seems that I own less and less compared to the days before digital technology took place. This is called the emergence of platforms. And these “platforms” are disrupting traditional business establishments and threatening to put them out of existence.

Every year, I seem to own less than what I use. The lesson that is all so obvious by now is the fact that possession today is no longer as important as access. To say that the world is changing is a grave understatement.

Guess what this does to my trainings and speaking? This means I need to catch up with the changing times. I need to embark on a non-stop learning journey and while the work can be taxing the end results enables me to do my work better.

My personal favorite training program offering “Level Up Leadership” has been gaining traction. When I started rolling this out January of last year a normal class in my public seminar consisting of 40-60 has grown to more than double its size. Those who have attended are now having the program brought to their headquarters and having me do in-house training.

This in itself is a major shift because it only confirms two things:

1. The corporate world today realizes the importance of doing Leadership training in order to update and upgrade their senior and mid-level leaders as they deal with what is called a “Great Demographic Disruption.” Seasoned, experienced and tenured executives need to develop the skills to lead and not manage the Millennials entering their workspace.

2. Soft-skills training are now essential in order to achieve “Engagement” in the workplace.

This poses as a challenge to me. The last time I updated my Level Up Leadership manual was December of last year and this year I need to update it again and would not wonder if 20 percent-30 percent of the materials will have to be removed or changed.

This is why many of those who have attended the session before and who would attend again claim that the program is not the same. While many appreciate this there will always be the one percent or less of the participants who would expect a more structured, formal and framework approach to leadership training and have a hard time catching up with the fluid and agile style of training I provide in the sessions. I guess this is just the way it is.

As of this writing, I am currently on my one-week study break, attending a leadership conference in New York, interviewing some of the featured speakers and learning from them. I have spent a fortune on research and studies and the pace has not slowed but has in fact sped up.

This is the world we are in today. Technology is not the threat to business. The real threat is that technology changes the consumer’s behavior and companies that do not adapt to their customer’s changing needs take the risk of losing the business.

Yet in all these, leadership training, education and consistent personal update and development are essential not only in keeping us relevant but to enable us to spot brand new opportunities for growth and success.

Technology drives change but leadership still reminds us that it will always be people who drive systems and things and never the other way around.

(Experience two inspiring days with Francis Kong learning leadership skills in this year’s last run of Level Up Leadership on November 23-24 at EDSA Shangri-La Hotel. For further inquiries contact Jen at +639158055910 or call April at +639285591798)