Change is the only constant in today’s world. The most interesting aspect is the rate of change. Earlier, we would be happy to anticipate a change once in a few years. This became months, days and now life changes almost every minute. One of the reasons could be technological breakthroughs in society. I remember in the eighties we would get an update of the world news on television only once a week. Today, we are updated every minute through news apps.

Organisations and individuals are constantly dealing with change every day. Let us first examine it from an organisation perspective. Every organisation is confronted with change at every stage of its evolution. If it is a startup, dealing with change is the foundation of its existence. After an organisation matures and becomes stable, change in the environment helps the organisation to shake itself out of slumber and learn and grow.

The story of change is no different for us as individuals. In the earlier years, we had the luxury of following age old practises without being challenged. Today the rate of change of the environment is faster than we can believe. It changes very rapidly and impacts us in multiple ways. Our success lies in anticipating the change, accepting it as our current reality and learning to adapt to the change to our best ability.

Our society is also dealing with change in every way. Nations, communities and societies are experiencing unprecedented change. The boundaries of nations get blurred with economic unions cutting across countries like the European Union. This makes change inevitable. Both suppliers and customers benefits from such changes. It also impacts regulations and taxes across countries.

The biggest challenge of change is our ability to accept it and adapt to it. If we resist change, then we get overwhelmed. I remember the first days of the computer and the email. Senior managers were wary of this change and felt powerless without their secretaries sorting out snail mails for them. They even resisted the use of computers for word processing and database management. Today the computer is gradually getting replaced by the mobile phone. Our office resides in the mobile phone and every activity can be done on it if we are willing to learn to do it.

I am aware of grand parents attending computer classes to learn to send emails and chat on video platforms with their grand children who live across the ocean in different continents. Age, sex, religion or nation will not matter to adapt to change. It is our mindset to unlearn, learn and relearn. It is important to remember that change is the only constant in an ever changing world around us.

The earlier we are able to anticipate this change and adapt to it, the more successful and happy we would be in life. Most of us spend time in denial. We then try to postpone an issue claiming that a particular change is not for me. It is this attitude we need to change. The moment we realise it, we become a winner. We are able to lead the change and reap the benefits from it much better than others.

Playing football in the pouring rain made me realise that change is good. If I could play in pouring rains, I could do better during normal weather.

It is important to realise that change does not wait for us. It encircles us and moves on. If we do not learn to change, we may get changed forcibly and that experience may not be good. It is better to master change then be engulfed by change. This is true as individuals, communities, societies, organisations or even nations. As someone nicely said, ” The future has a habit of suddenly and dramatically becoming the present.” If we learn to foresee this future, we lead the change.

Lets change today.

S Ramesh Shankar