“The Power of Leadership”

While doing research for a client, I ran across a short piece by Peter Drucker titled, “Reinvent Yourself”.

Knowledge people must take responsibility for their own development and placement.

In today’s society and organizations, people work increasingly with knowledge, rather than with skills. Knowledge and skill differ in a fundamental characteristic – skills change very, very slowly. Knowledge, however, changes itself. It makes itself obsolete, and very rapidly. A knowledge worker becomes obsolescent if he or she does not go back to school every three or four years.

This not only means that the equipment of learning, of knowledge, of skill, of experience that one acquires early is not sufficient for our present life time and working time. People change over such a long time span. They become different persons with different needs, different abilities, different perspectives, and, therefore, with a need to “reinvent themselves.” I quite intentionally use a stronger word than “revitalize.” If you talk of fifty years of working life – and this, I think, is going to be increasingly the norm – you have to reinvent yourself. You have to make something different out of yourself, rather than just find a new supply of energy.

Peter Drucker was referring to people today choosing to or having to work longer periods of time during their life times. However, in today’s world-wide economic down-turn we are seeing more and more people falling into the “have-to-work-longer” categories. In many of these cases people are having to “reinvent” themselves as their old positions and sometimes careers may no longer be available to them.

If you are facing either voluntarily or involuntarily the need to reinvent yourself, let us know. Performance Institute may be able to help you smooth the learning process.

“Our discussion is about no ordinary matter, but on the right way to conduct our lives” … Plato.

Have A Good Day!

Russ
Performance Institute – A Global Leader in Human Capital Development

Russ M. Miller, LLIF, Chairman & CEO

Shawn M. Miller, Managing Partner – USA