Knowledge can't be your core competency in a connected world
In 1910 you were considered educated if you possessed the total knowledge found in that day’s paper.
Today, 2010 – what’s the apples to apples comparison?
An example.
If I asked you if you knew what Sarcomatoid Mesothelioma is – would you know?
Most likely not.
But if I asked you to find me the answer would you know where to go?
Yes. Google. (they have 70% or so world market share)
So does that mean you actually did know what Sarcomatoid Mesothelioma was the first time I asked, since you could pull up the answer in just a matter of seconds?
Hmmmm.
If you live in a ‘connected culture’ your definition of knowledge (or Epistemology) has radically changed over the last 100 years. If you live in a hut in the Amazon (therefore not reading this post) then your epistemology has changed very little if at all.
So what does this mean?
Niche knowledge industries are becoming a commodity in the ‘connect world’. You see this with how audits and how they are being shopped in the market place right now. Price wins….unless…..you focus beyond ‘knowledge’ on thinks like relationships, trust, and the ability to communicate.
In today’s world, ‘knowing’ tax law has been reduced to the power of search and tax applications. However, if your practice’s success is built on such ‘knowledge’, then you are headed for destruction. On the other hand, if your practice has the ability to communicate, thus transforming knowledge into wisdom (actionable knowledge) then you will become an invaluable partner to your clients.
Below is Google’s Super Bowl ad – also their first ever commercial. An example of what I mean by the example mentioned above.
Anyone else find it weird that today that he is doing two things I thought a president shouldn’t do….
-Speak in a church ‘to the congregation’
-go campaigning for a fellow democrat
5 things about technology | The Past is Prologue
- Technology giveth and taketh away
- New technologies are never distributed evenly among the population. This means that every new technology benefits some and harms others
- Embedded in every technology there is a powerful idea, sometimes two or three powerful ideas
- Technological change is not additive; it is ecological
- media tend to become mythic
“What’s past is prologue” - Shakespeare
A powerful, worthwhile read from Niel Postman, see link below. Thanks @taylorbrooks for the read.
And, I would add, if Christ cries out, “Mine!” then the obligation of Christian people in the Church is to look at all of creation and cry out, “His!”
Jesus is Lord over every aspect of life — how we spend our time, what we read, how we form our families, the way in which we build neighborhoods,
the law, politics, science, music, medicine, and on and on.“
"The Less Fortunate" Prayer
The prayer concludes….. “and God I would like to pray for those less fortunate”.
We have all heard a prayer, though words may differ slightly, that consists of that concept. We may have even been the person praying it. I have. But what does it mean?
Fresh off thanksgiving where we give thanks for health & houses - we often lose sight on what basis to give thanks. I by no means here want to start a notion that I am, nor should we be, not thankful for the material comforts in life; coffee, couches, houses, cars, etc. But if -
He who has God and everything has no more than he who has God alone. - CS Lewis
But If - if this statement holds, how does it effect the way we think about “The Less Fortunate” prayer? What does fortunate mean? Even more important in this context what does ‘less fortunate’ mean? We find our thoughts polarizing if the CS Lewis statement makes sense with our mental model. We must change the way we think and consequentially the way we pray.
The popular notion, religious or not, is that prosperity equals physical comfort. In tandem, since there has been a class system, there is a poor peasant mentality. Don’t you find it interesting that all of people, you and I, have a ‘grass is greener’ complex. Always wanting more, thinking about the ‘what ifs’ of life, and so on. At the same time we have a ‘grass is browner’ complex, where we begin to compare what we have versus the have nots. Both complexes will lead to a soiled fount, because in both cases we find comparison is the thief of joy. Joy is not found in but One have or have not. Have or have not Him? That question & answer is the chief of all pursuits and pleasures.
If you agree with CS Lewis then your prayer must change and become singular. If you disagree, then you can be thankful that you are not me - for I must be the lesser, less fortunate, one.
