Walking Confidently in the Wrong Direction

The most rapid workforce, economic and societal evolutions in history are happening at once, and most of us respond to that by freezing or retreating. Neither works.

This talk is about the third option: keep walking, out loud, while you correct course. It closes on an idea I call the Knowledge Quotient, which is simply the ratio between the knowledge you take in from the world and the knowledge you already carry.

The measure of intelligence is the ability to change.

Albert Einstein

What the talk covers

1. 1

   Get in the business of reinventing yourself

   Change is not an interruption of the work. At the pace things now move, reinvention is the work. What we should be afraid of is not changing direction; it is freezing or retreating.

2. 2

   Learn to let go

   Much of life is about letting go. Walking confidently in any direction does not mean you get everything you want. It means you are in a position to release what did not happen and carry on.

3. 3

   Get clear on who you are

   Your Knowledge Quotient is the balance between what you absorb from outside - the internet, other people, societal norms - and what comes from your inner world. Most people never ask what their ratio is. The real you is the part that hears your own thoughts and feels your own feelings.

4. 4

   Grow your own garden of thinking

   You have to plant, nurture and pay thoughtful attention for anything to grow. Cultivate your own ideas and you will recognise sooner when it is time to reinvent, to let go, or to rebalance.

Figures cited

• McKinsey research, 2019: organisations lose more than 530,000 working days and $250 million every year to poor communication.
• Deloitte Women @ Work, 2023; Harvard Business Review, 2014; Visier research, 2023: fewer than 40% of the workforce aspires to management.