The
European HRTech conference was held last week in Amsterdam. I didn’t attend but my interest was tweaked
by twitter feeds about VUCA.
VUCA
is a nicely packed acronym which describes the opposite of being contained and
controlled. Another military derived
concept now used in leadership and organisational circles, it was originally
used to describe extreme battlefield conditions. It stands for Volatile, Uncertain, Complex and
Ambiguous.
And
its popularity as a term is growing.
Increasingly
it is used by leaders to explain the nature of the environment they are operating
in. Such leaders are looking to organisational
experts like Impact International to help build their capacity to navigate through
their VUCA landscape.
One
perspective is that there is another word for VUCA, and that is... normal. These 4 areas may manifest themselves differently
depending on the context, but for many, the acronym captures life as it is, as
it always will be, for all of us. Saatchi& Saatchi CEO Kevin Roberts, who likes to keep us on our toes,
believes we are in a super-VUCA world. But
I am pretty sure he doesn’t mean super-normal.
Indeed, in my opinion, the danger of seeing VUCA as normal, fails to
acknowledge the speed at which change is happening and what is at stake for our
communities, companies and planet.
So without
dismissing the rigour of the concept, I felt compelled to play with the acronym through a different lens. Drawing on positive psychology, sustainability and mother nature wisdom, I offer another set
of words, another perspective. Namely, that
a VUCA world is:
- Vibrant – everything is a source of life
- Universal – there are universal truths, laws of nature, patterns and symmetry amongst it all
- Connected – everything is interconnected
- Agile – we are all in constant change
And
to respond to such conditions, we need leaders and we need ourselves to be:
- Visionary – to dream big and help others share those dreams
- Understanding – to seek to understand oneself and others
- Curious – to cultivate interest, ideas and connections
- Aware – to be fully present, aware and attentive
Perhaps taking into consideration this revamped VUCA as well, will help remind us to take a more holistic, creative,
courageous and sustainable view of the dynamic challenges we face.
Notes:
- http://www.impactinternational.com/
- http://www.impactinternational.com/blog/2012/01/leadership-vuca-world
- http://www.forbes.com/sites/avidan/2012/10/14/in-a-vuca-world-unilever-bets-on-sustainable-living-as-a-transformative-business-model/
- http://www.thedrum.com/news/2012/04/25/marketing-dead-says-saatchi-saatchi-ceo#WZ5YAgWV5F0qSR4c.99
- Image courtesy of ddpavumba/FreeDigitialPhotos.net
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