TWC WEEK FOUR

In class this week, our main discussion point was about CHANGE.

How our world has changed and specifically, the importance of leadership and management in making changes in a corporation.

The class started off with a video of "Who moved my cheese?". I absolutely enjoyed the movie and found myself asking myself who would I be in that scenario. The mice, Sniff and Scurry or the two little people Hem and Haw? As the name suggest, sniff and scurry are the more observant people who are always constantly aware of their surroundings and adapting to changes. While Hem and Haw take what they have for granted and never expect changes to happen. When it does happen though, they refuse to admit to the change and just hem and haw their time away.

Personally, I think I am a little of both. In some situations, I am slower in identifying the change but once I do, I adapt quickly. I do not think this is something to be proud of as for one to be slow in realizing the change can cause one to miss many great opportunities in life. Thus, it has become my mid year resolution to be more observant to my surroundings!

Similarly, Prof gave analogies to the different ways corporations react to changes. Organizations can be...  

Eagles who has the bird's eye view of the surroundings. 

Ostriches who keeps its head buried underground and stays oblivious to the changes happening.

Dodo birds who were unaware of the changes taking place and hence is now extinct. 

Change is happening every second of our lives, thus how should we deal with it? People need to be alert and embrace the change by being adaptable. Only then can we make improvements which can further develop ourselves and our lives. 

Also, one of the readings I was particularly interested in was about the Global Divers of Change to 2060 where it predicted the world in 2060. While it is exciting to learn about the development of future technologies that will aid our fossil fuel crisis, enhance the global education level and how globalization will further reduce our cultural differences, the other factors seem a lot more worrying.

The world population is expected to peak at 10 billion which raises concern on whether we can produce enough supply of food. Our health is also under threat due to preventable lifestyle diseases and the old diseases will become resistant to the current control techniques. The marine life for fishes may be over due to over pollution, acidification and over-fishing. The world they talk about in 2060 does not sound promising. There are so many uncertainties and problems that makes me questions on whether we would still be able to survive in such an environment. The public should definitely read this report so as to have a better understanding of their world and the changes taking place. If people choose to be an ostrich or a dodo bird, whereby they either are unaware of the changes or choose to live in denial, mankind may become extinct sooner than expected. 

Hence as a start, to those who have not read this report Drivers to world change 2060, please do so now. Be the eagle who is aware of the future changes so that we can take note, adapt and possibly make a change to our changing world. 

Overall, I had yet another enjoyable time in class this week with so much to take away hence giving it a rating 7 out of 10. However, I felt that little was discussed with regards to the topic of change management and leadership and perhaps some examples of the corporations which managed to handle the changes well. 

Can't wait for more!

Selene