May 1, 2002	Volume 2, Issue 18
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Learn from the Mastodon

by Rick Brenner

Not long ago, Mastodons roamed North America in large numbers. Cousins to the elephant, they thrived in the cool, sub-glacial climate. But the climate warmed, and human hunters arrived. The Mastodon couldn't adapt, and now it's extinct. Change is now coming to your profession. Can you adapt?

bout 11,000 years ago, the climate in North America warmed. Glaciers melted, rainfall patterns changed, and the differences between summer and winter increased. The Mastodon, which thrived in a cool climate, suddenly found life difficult. A specialist, it couldn't adapt fast enough. It was under stress.

At about the same time, humans appeared in force. Some scientists believe that human hunting and other activity also contributed to stress on the Mastodon, both directly and indirectly.

When the climate warmed, and their food disappeared, and humans started hunting them, the Mastodons couldn't respond. Extinction followed.

Are you adaptable? Or are you a Mastodon?

Because adaptability gives companies a competitive edge, they train us in Organizational Change. They talk about organizational agility as a corporate asset.

But many companies send mixed messages. Though they extol organizational agility, they still hire specialists, instead of people with proven ability to learn and adapt. They pay premiums for specialized skills, and even promote on the basis of proven specialized competencies.

If you work for an
"agile organization," it pays
to be pretty agile yourselfSuch organizations tend to employ specialized professionals who find it difficult to adapt. When these organizations need new skills, they hire them, or they outsource. They jettison specialists they no longer need — their mastodons.

If you work in an "agile organization," and you're a highly specialized professional, you can't be certain how long that environment will remain friendly to your specialization. And unless you can adapt to the coming changes, you'll become extinct.

How can you avoid extinction?

Get ahead of the climate

Be attentive to professional climate changes — the big, slow changes in your industry and profession. If you were a secretary or administrative assistant in 1985, you had to be a good typist. Computer skills were a nice plus, but not essential. Now, typewriters are irrelevant.

New technologies and new ways of doing business can change everything. To avoid extinction, learn about five-year trends in your profession. Get ahead of the climate.

Stay close to your food sources

Your food sources are your company's customers. Are the products and services that you help produce attracting more and more customers? Or are they losing customers?

If they're losing customers, consider an internal transfer or a hop to a company that's gaining customers year after year. Stay close to your food sources.

Outrun the hunters

Your hunters are professional skills that substitute for the skills you have. For instance, if you're a COBOL expert in an IT organization, Web-based technologies have reduced the value of your skills. You'll either have to find a company that's Web-averse, or learn Web-based technologies, or find another career.

If your specialty is mature, target a new, fast-growing specialty and become an early expert. Outrun the hunters.

If you do all these things, you're more likely to avoid the fate of the Mastodon. And you'll be following the path of a different, but very successful species — Human Beings.  Top    Next Issue

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See also Personal, Team, and Organizational Effectiveness for more related articles.

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Public seminars

Person-to-Person Communication for Project Managers

When we talk, listen, send or read emails, read or write memos, or when we leave or listen to voice mail messages, we're communicating person-to-person. And whenever we communicate person-to-person, we risk being misunderstood, offending others, feeling hurt, and being confused. There are so many ways for things to go wrong that we could never learn how to fix all the problems. A more effective approach avoids problems altogether, or at least minimizes their occurrence. In this very interactive program you'll learn a model of inter-personal communications that can help you stay out of the ditch. In those moments of intense involvement, when we're most likely to slip, you'll have a new tool to use to keep things constructive. Read more about this program. Here are some upcoming dates for this program:

• Download to
  your calendarDes Moines, IA: February 16, Breakfast Meeting, Central Iowa Chapter of The Project Management Institute. Register now.
   
• Download to
  your calendarDes Moines, IA: February 16, Lunch Meeting, Central Iowa Chapter of The Project Management Institute. Register now.
   
• Houston, Texas: May 8, Monthly Meeting, Houston Chapter of the Project Management Institute.
   
• Houston, Texas: May 9, Monthly Meeting, Houston Chapter of the Project Management Institute.
   

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• Download to
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Most of us can assess technological risks, but risks related to human behavior tend to resist our best efforts. This session provides a framework for evaluating risks related to the behavior of individuals, teams, organizations and people generally. Human-centered risk differs from technological or market risk, because objective evaluation requires acknowledging personal and organizational limitations and failures. Since some of those limitations and failures might apply to the people assessing the risks, or to their superiors, there's a tendency to deny them or to explain them away. Our approach examines capability, organization, context, risk mitigation, and workplace politics. It has tools for guiding the assessment and management of human-centered risk, and we show how to extend these tools to suit your situation. You'll learn how to identify sources of risk in human behavior; recognize systemic and individual barriers to acknowledging risk; assess the effects of organizational turbulence; determine the risk associated with inappropriate internal risk transfer; estimate the effects of team dysfunction, toxic conflict and turnover; and measure the impact of workplace politics. Read more about this program. Here's an upcoming date for this program:

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On 14 December 1911, four men led by Roald Amundsen reached the South Pole. Thirty-five days later, Robert F. Scott and four others followed. Amundsen had won the race to the pole. Amundsen's party returned to base on 26 January 1912. Scott's party perished. As historical drama, why this happened is interesting enough, but to project managers, the story is fascinating. Lessons abound. Read more about this program. Here's an upcoming date for this program:

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• Columbia, Missouri: May 17, Monthly Meeting, Mid Missouri Chapter of the Project Management Institute.
   

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• Rochester, New York: May 24, Professional Development Day, Rochester Chapter of the Project Management Institute.