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News Release Click here to go back to main News and Trends page >> Much has been written about change and how people resist change. What is change? It simply means things are not the same? We cannot keep doing the same thing and still expect to do as well. It is insanity. Think of brands like Smith Corona and Olivetti. They were good solid typewriter manufacturers that are no longer around. Why? One reason could be that they did not see a need to change. Learn the lesson or suffer the consequences. Change is uncomfortable, but change is necessary for us to grow. Unless we grow, we die - organizations are no different. I was told that two thirds of Fortune 500 companies disappear from the list every 15 years. If you love what you do, you will never work another day in your life- Confucius At least eight generations of Personal Computers(PCs) have passed us by in the last decade or two, including Pentium 4, P3, P2, P1, 486, 386, 286, and XT. Moore�s law states that the speed of a processing chip doubles every eighteen months, while cost remains constant. As PCs become more powerful, they also become more affordable due to technological advances. Applying that principle to ourselves, when did we last update our brains? For some, it could have stood still since the time they left school! They are stuck with an old paradigm and they tell war stories about their glory days. That is a good clue to their last brain update. As a career practitioner, when was your last brain update? Was it your �O level exams? You may be using your brain everyday but those are mainly routine functions. Unless the brain is stretched or challenged, it does not grow. When new connections are not made frequently enough, we lose our edge. That could be the beginning of the end. Can you run your operation effectively using a ten-year-old computer? In the internet age, 10 years is equivalent to 70 years! Have you ever wondered if some of your clients could still be operating in that �ancient� mode?! Or even yourself? For a start, watch less TV. It is too passive. Exercise your brain by seeing more, hearing more, thinking more. Like any muscle, it becomes weak if it is not stretched. Use your senses and go for new experiences. Our brain remembers everything we see from the time we are born. It is like a bank account. The various experiences are just being stored in different parts of the memory. But it is more than just a database. It has the ability to mix and match, integrate, separate, synthesize, and create new ideas. The more exposed you are, the more ideas you can generate. Are the career coaching techniques and methodologies you use with your clients today the same ones you used when you graduated from University? Or are they validated and adapted for the Asian context? Key learning point: we can only coach our clients up to the limit of our abilities. If we are using outdated techniques and assumptions, imagine the damage we can do ourselves, and our clients. This article was excerpted and adapted from Han Kok Kwang�s latest book, Beyond Buzzwords. Han is chief consultant at Worklife Asia Pte Ltd., and the first Singaporean Credentialed Career Master (USA) in Asia. He is also a founding member of AACMP. Han is the youngest winner of the National HR Professional of the Year Award and author of number 1 bestseller - So What If You Don�t Have A Degree? He donated all proceeds from the first thousand copies to the Spastic Children�s Association of Singapore. Together with the North-East CDC and partners, Beyond Buzzwords has raised $100,000 for community development programs for the disadvantaged even before it is launched to the public. Han Kok Kwang |
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