Free Risky is the New Safe by Randy Gage Page B

normal.
    This means individuals will take a personal responsibility for their own education. It will likely include elements of the traditional education system but will also require an additional mix of alternative, experiential, and contrarian content.
Playing to Win in the Shark Tank
    For companies, the most important resource in which to invest will become people. Of course, many companies claim that they already do this—but that is simply window dressing. This investment will need to become deeply integrated in the corporate culture.
    For HR departments, the focus will shift to stronger recruiting, more vetting, and creating the best free-agent packages. Of course, a lot more of these workers will be independent contractors. But all of them will need to be wooed and paid based upon what they bring to the table. Your success as a human resources manager will be judged on your ability to sign the premier free agents.
    I believe you’ll see a return to companies encouraging employees to continue their education and even be willing to participate in the cost. But just as athletes have to refund a portion of their signing bonus if they walk away, don’t be surprised to see companies requiring a certain amount of service in return for what they invest in an employee’s or contractor’s education.
    Keynote speakers, trainers, and consultants will see increased demand, but they’ll provide more and more of their services from the cloud.
Results-Based Compensation
    The changes we’re discussing will increase accountability for both employees and employers, and that’s a good thing. The days of keeping your head low and hiding out in a cubicle are over. You’ll see more and greater focus placed on results-based compensation. Employees will be required to demonstrate value; and to keep the good performers, companies will need to show they aren’t just running a slash-and-burn operation to generate higher dividends every quarter.
    The new order companies won’t be in industries like manufacturing, medicine, or even technology. The most powerful companies will be in education and information—more specifically, helping people and companies process the overwhelming avalanche of information to which they are exposed.
    These new order companies and the people who work in them will need to become more innovative, change faster, and be willing to take risks. They’ll also have to be much smarter, because the speed at which change is happening is now so fast, being nimble won’t be enough. As we discussed in Act I, reacting fast will not be sufficient. You have to foresee trends and be one of the first people to adopt them.
    Creativity will be king, and ideas will drive that creativity. Those ideas are what will allow you to enjoy success in a rapidly changing world. In the next act we’ll explore a strategy they aren’t teaching yet in the business schools: how to move fast and break things!

Act III
Move Fast and Break Things
    That quote I used for the chapter title was the daily mantra for Mark Zuckerberg and the Facebook clan as they grew their company from a modest networking website for college kids into the largest social media juggernaut in the world.
    Breaking things may be risky, but in the new space, playing safe pretty much guarantees you will fail .
    Down is up, and up is down. All of the developments we’ve discussed thus far have redefined not only what success is, but how you get there today. People hanging on to the past will get left behind, but people who are willing to move fast and break things will succeed at levels we have yet to see.
    Here’s a small, but mind-bending cross section of how some of these challenges actually offer great opportunities.
The New Reality of Marketing
    We now live in the age of overload. The human brain has never had to process as much information as it is required to today. The average person is besieged with a torrent