TRANSFORMATION: A WORD WHOSE TIME HAS FINALLY COME

 
 
 

TRANSFORMATION: A WORD WHOSE TIME HAS FINALLY COME

Herb Rubenstein
CEO, Herb Rubenstein Consulting

“There can be no successful ebusiness without etransformation”
Jack Pellicci
Director, Global Strategic Projects
Oracle
December 4, 1999
Strategic Leadership Forum Conference

Introduction

The word “transformation” in modern English has been around for hundreds of years. The concept “transformation” has been around for thousands of years. As we start the year 2000, the word and the concept are becoming not “a” reality, but “the” reality of our times.

Historical Content

Writers such as the great Jesuit theologian Pierre Teihand de Chardin and Marilyn Ferguson (The Aquarian Conspiracy), seminar leaders including Werner Erloud, Fernando Flores and Tony Mikhail Gorbachev have centered their entire careers around this word. Yet, few people around the world have a clear, working definition of transformation that can be used successfully on a daily basis. In the year 2000 alone this word will become known and used by more people than have ever used it in the entire history of the world.

What Is Transformation

Transformation is the result of a process that creates a significant, lasting change.

Transformation can be produced by a physical act, but usually transformation, as it applies to human beings consists of a shift in attitude, state of being, identity, awareness and approach to life.

Transformation is not when heat “changes” water to steam or extreme cold “changes” hydrogen to a metal. Hydrogen is a metal. Steam is chemically the same as water. No transformation has occurred because no fundamental or lasting change has occurred in these examples.
The process of transformation can be unconscious and not “directed” (caterpillars becomes butterflies, people age and change their physical shapes and change brain wave thought patterns and life preferences).

The growing explosion of “transformation” that we see occurring is a conscious directed form. The working definition of this type of transformation is that transformation occurs when the answer to a question in your life (or the life of an organization) that has been consistently “NO,” over time all of a sudden becomes “YES,” or when the answer to a question that has been consistently over time been “YES,” becomes “NO.”

Examples

Here are some examples:

Since the beginning of time until the past few years only a very few people, on the planet, have had the means and ability to communicate to and receive communication from large numbers of people simultaneously.

Can you, a normal human being of average resources, communicate to and receive communication from thousands, even millions of people simultaneously? Answer: From the beginning of time until 1999, the answer was “NO.” From 1999 into the future, the answer is “YES.”

Can we produce enough food, clothing and shelter to feed, clothe and house every human being on the planet in a satisfactory manner for their entire lives? Answer: From the beginning of time until the 1990’s the answer was “NO.” From the mid 1990’s into the future the answer is “YES.”

Can a single business, non-profit organization or educational institution or business serve hundreds of millions of customers with consistent, reliable, low cost goods, education and services? Until the late 1990’s the answer was “NO.” Now it is “YES.”

Can government gather, analyze and use information from hundreds of millions of citizens and residents collected daily to adopt and implement better and more efficient government policies and programs and can citizens gather, analyze and use information about government activities to monitor, change and redirect government policies and programs on a daily basis. The answer to this question from the beginning of time to the year 2000 is and will be “NO.” But around 2002 the new answer will be “YES.”

These transformations are huge, irreversible, lasting shifts. They are part of the very first wave of transformations that will affect every person on the planet.

One additional example will drive home the point. Can humans place electronic or molecular based computer changes in their body to improve their physical and mental functions? The answer from the beginning of time to the 1980’s was “NO.” With the pacemaker pumping our hearts, the answer changed forever. Over the next few years, blind people will have electronic cameras inserted into their eyes to beam light to the retina to allow them to see, people will have voice transmitting and receiving devices implanted near their ears to better, send and receive communication across distances without phones and radios; people will have memory devices (chips) implanted in their brains that allow them to access billions of records instantly for use in their work and personal lives and to detect allergens in the environment.

A Way Of Life

Transformation, the rapid, lasting change that paves the way for even faster changes is now becoming a way of life. Individual transformation occurs when one takes on additional responsibility. In our wired, connected world, in the year 2000, more and more people will be able and willing to take responsibility for achieving a high quality of their business and personal life for not only themselves, but for others on the planet. Students, who transform very quietly, have already transformed themselves into global police stopping several shop operations. Parents and educational businesses and non-profits transforming themselves into “educational revolutionaries” creating alternative delivery and content for forms of education for not only their children, but for children all over the world. Medical knowledge and technological advancements will give humans the ability (but in many cases not the willingness by itself) to transform their diets, life styles and habits that will help humans live healthily to 120 years old.

How Transformation Begins

Transformation starts with a willingness to welcome, invite and actively seek new, different answers to important questions that have been around for a long time. The question, “Who am I?” has been around forever. In the past the answers for many people have been quite static. For the future, people will search not only for the new career, the new possessions, the new diet, the new communication device and the new city, suburb or rural area, they will search for and find a new ability to transform themselves, to make significant, lasting shifts in who they are and who they want to be on a rapid fire basis.

In management, a key principle is to “manage the expectations” of your customers, employees, vendors and everyone else associated with your enterprise. The phrase “the best surprise is no surprise” is a true legacy of the late 20th century. In the 21st century this human bondage to the “status quo” or “same answer to the same question” will beat a very fast retreat.

The Internet And Transformation

Transformation – the process of significant lasting change – will become pervasive. Products, personal attitudes, governance systems, legal structure, business methods will become obsolete at an incredibly fast rate. Today we can view a billion pages of information on the internet. In a few years it will be in the trillions of pages. In 1935 in the United States many high school students could not even get a single textbook to use. Today, the billion pages of information on the internet and related data bases costs less to access than the 200 page high school textbook that my father could not afford to buy.

Transformation Requires Awareness

Transformation requires the awareness that we can change the answer to the question. Today, people can do become aware of “what’s out there” and “what’s possible” at the speed of light. One person in an organization of 150,000 can learn or discover something at 2:00 p.m. and at 2:01 p.m. it can broadcasted to all 150,000 employees of that organization, their customers, vendors and stakeholders.

Transformation Is Cumulative

Transformation is cumulative. One can transform themselves from “couch potato” to an athlete, in seconds by tapping into the natural athlete in every human being. Once a person has made the transformation to the “status” of athlete, health benefits accrue not only to the person but to society at large. Similarly, one can transform one self from considering transition “not very smart” to becoming “very well informed” through the explosion of electronic based information at their fingertips.

Transformation – More Than A New Buzz Word

Transformation, like money and resources, has a tendency to “clump” – to stick with a relative few who practice the art and grow in the process. In the year 2000 transformation will spread to huge numbers small, medium and large organizations, individuals and governments. Managers, workers, civil servants, family members, leaders and followers will ask less of tax “How can we fix this?” or “How can we improve this?” or “How can we do this better?” and will ask more often “How can we transform ourselves to make the best out of this selection and create better situations in the future?”

Transformation And You

Transformation starts with you. It is a tool. It will become the most popular business and personal development tool used to improve life on the planet over the next several years. Job teller such as “Chief Transformation Officer” will replace “chief technology officer.” “Remember 50 years ago we had job titles like “chief telephone operator” and “chief electrical officer.”

Transformation And Freedom

Transformation is based on the concepts of freedom. The year 2000 brings together for the first time in the history of the human race sufficient technological capabilities, economic resources, dispersion of knowledge and information and leadership necessary to create the foundation for transformation to occur on a regular, daily basis in the lives of all people.

Key Questions For You And Your Organizations

In the year 2000, you will see nations, companies, non-profit organizations and educational institutions,
products and services and individuals transform. For you, long held answers to such simple, personal questions such as:

  • “Do I have the time (energy, resources) to
    do what I really want to do in life?”
  • “Am I the master of my own life?”
  • “Am I living every moment fully?”
  • “Am I helping make the world the best possible place you can make it?”
  • “Am I an athlete?”
  • “Am I a visionary?”

Conclusion

Think how your life would transform if you transformed even one “NO” answer to “YES” in the year 2002. Welcome to the future. Welcome aboard.

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© 2007 Herb Rubenstein Consulting