Fundamental changes in the world are creating unprecedented changes in the global competitive environment … even different from a few years ago. Businesses are painfully aware of this reality. Look at what a few are saying:
It is a world in which comfort with ideas and abstractions is the passport to a good job, in which creativity and innovation are the way to the good life, in which high levels of education — a very different education than most of us had — are going to be the only security there is.
Report of the New Commission on the Skills of the American Workforce
Today’s complexity is expected to rise, and more than half of CEOs doubt their ability to manage it. … Creativity is the most important leadership quality.
Capitalizing on Complexity, IBM Global CEO Study 2010
Constant reinvention is the central necessity at GE. … We’re all just a moment away from commodity hell.
Jeffrey Immelt, Chairman & CEO, General Electric
As leaders and managers, we have to motivate our people to come up with workable solutions to problems that weren’t even on the radar screen when they were hired. There’s no operator’s manual for most of what we will ask people to work on. But somehow, together, we’ll figure it out.
Beth Comstock, Chief Marketing Officer, General Electric
It is not enough to instruct a child or young adult in how to follow directions. Machines can do that — and they can increasingly replace us in that endeavor. The mission [of school] used to be to create homogenized, obedient, satisfied workers and pliant, eager consumers. No longer. We need to teach children to lead and solve interesting problems.
Seth Godin, popular author
One problem we see is that the majority of educators, who spent their entire career in education, are not fully cognizant of these new dynamics. Further, parents believe that their children should get an education “just like the one they got.” After all, they turned out OK. But nothing is further from the truth. We cannot begin to address the enormous new demands on education until we as a community are better informed.
Here are a few presentations and other materials that we have used to get that message out. We will add more as they are developed.