What is a concept? A concept is an idea that conceives or forms the understanding, that is, a thought expressed in words. It is also defined as an opinion or judgment. Entrepreneurs, managers and company personnel have a lot of opinions, judgments and ideas of what business is, what a company is, what processes are, what the quality of products represents and services, which is customer satisfaction, and so many more concepts referring to the different aspects related to economic activity, business and the market.
In an era of very rapid changes, the concepts acquired yesterday are no longer useful today, they have ceased to be useful. If the Gutenberg printing press was a revolutionary fact by reducing publication costs and therefore allowed a greater number of people to acquire knowledge, today the Internet allows at a very low cost and globally to bring new ideas, concepts, products and services. The conjunction of computing and communications have revolutionized the sphere of knowledge, thereby expanding the limits of action. Therefore the time has come not to stick to the limits, but to work with them through the imagination.
Imagination is the most powerful weapon that man possesses. The imagination added to the effort have allowed this impressive achievements. Now, that enormous flow of energy can be turned to good or evil. The imagination of man surpassing all limits, including moral limits, made feasible both the factories of death during World War II, with processes and activities carefully analyzed in terms of effectiveness and efficiency aimed at the massive and standardized destruction of human beings, as it also gave rise at the beginning of this new century to the destruction in minutes of the Twin Towers on September 11 using commercial aircraft.
Imagination and creativity can be used for good or for evil, what it is all about here is to use them to improve day by day the quality of life of man, through a more equitable and productive use of resources, increasing production without destroying the environment, allowing the development of individuals at work and enabling society to continually go in search of new achievements that enrich it not only materially but also spiritually.
When before I affirmed about not sticking to limits, but rather working with them, reference was clearly made to creativity put into action to solve problems that our current mental schemas have not known or been able to solve. This does not mean to make statements about the moral limits that must be the firm base on which technological growth can develop. The question then is to know, what are those moral limits, something that we will deal with in the later development.
We can affirm, of course, that the mere management or technical and scientific knowledge does not imply making the best use of resources, nor adopting the best decisions that benefit society as a whole.
Returning to the initial content around the concepts, the question must be asked of which concepts should be re-evaluated and therefore reconceived, and the reasons for this need.
These ideas or concepts that we have about the world, and business in particular, are like the lenses through which we perceive the environment and our own being. We are largely what we think, and we think based on what we are and feel. Be aware of this, and from there adopt a systematic attitude to test each concept that we have individually and as a group in terms of business, administration, processes, systems, products, quality and designs, among others, giving rise to the possibility of new realities is the fundamental objective of this development.
Descartes gave rise to this system of thought that, doubting everything, thereby sought to delve into the causes and reasons of each fact or circumstance, thus conceived as a methodology of inquiry, was used as a way of understanding and philosophically restructuring man and the cosmos.
Today the incessant technological, scientific and cultural advance with the effects that they have in the business world make it necessary to create a method or system destined to reconceptualize and recreate our vision of them. The paradigms (set of judgments and ideas through which we conceive and judge reality) that served to make decisions and solve problems in an era, are no longer useful in this new era marked by new realities in production processes and techniques, and in individual and social needs.
It is the creatives who have the greatest possibility of positioning themselves in the leading positions, whether they are individuals or companies. The question is now, can companies also be creative? The answer is yes. How? Encouraging both individual creativity and teamwork. Teamwork has the ability to combine the knowledge and experiences of many and varied individuals who thus through a transaction of ideas and experiences can generate new products, services, processes and problem solutions. Leading collective intelligence for the creative generation of ideas, and firmly supporting the work of individuals in the organization is one of the main functions and roles of the 21st century executive.
- Revolutionaries and Conservatives in the business world. The work of leaders.
In the same way that in the field of politics, in the face of certain circumstances in the development of realities, the need for new ideas and concepts that better adapt to the new times and the changes they require arise. So the conditions are in place, but it requires individuals to lead the change. Once these changes have taken place, the individuals who generated them fall in love with their own ideas, ignore dialectical processes, do not recognize that the only permanent reality is continuous change, and seek to avoid any change, slaves to their ideas and fearful of change, that is they went from being revolutionaries to being conservatives. The new leaders required by companies and organizations in the 21st century are those involved with the permanent revolution.Those willing to destroy their own concepts to generate new and more powerful ones. Leaders must privilege pragmatism over dogmatism that will lead to their disappearance and their companies. Thus the missions and values of companies must be continually reconsidered in light of new realities. The mission that at another time could take a company to the first places, today may mean taking it to the grave. The leader must have the ability to constantly create and recreate the ideas and concepts that guide the company. An individual cannot be content with being a creative at one stage of his life. The current reality requires constant creativity, and if you no longer have that strength, you must make room for other creatives to continue the process by moving to a position of adviser or consultant.In this way, the company will retain the strength to create, but will also keep within itself the rich experience of previous leaders.
The modern leader must not only excel at his creativity, but must also encourage and support the creativity of his subordinates.
4. Innovation. Creativity put into practice
Innovating implies introducing something new, which means creating new concepts and ideas, in this case in the business world, that originate new processes, products, services and strategies in the business field. In this way, innovation is creativity put into practice, that is, creating new ideas and bringing them to the field of production. What until then was an outline, a plan, a formula, a program, begins to develop in the material field. The sculptor's idea becomes embodied in marble, it ceases to be just an idea to be a sculpture. Said in Aristotelian terms, what the idea represented as power, became an act like sculpture.
What is the implication of this in the business world? Leaders and strategists must understand that as long as you only have one idea, however good it is, it represents only one potential. The leader's job is to seize resources and manage them effectively to transform those ideas into concrete businesses. Let us think of any field of high technology, from pharmaceutical to computer science, having the best idea and not quickly putting it into practice may be keeping only papers, because in today's super-computerized and hyper-communicated world, many researchers and companies work with similar ideas at the same time. From this we have an important new rule: not only must you be creative, but also the ideas generated must be put in motion quickly in the field of business.
We live in an age in which time is already measured in nanoseconds, showing even more its value and its measurement. In a totally interconnected world, time is of great value, and much more if we take into account that from the year 2000 knowledge must double every ten years.
5. The new realities
To new environments correspond new ideas and paradigms. Trying to continue seeing, analyzing and making decisions in light of concepts that corresponded to other circumstances, is not having sufficient flexibility or mental capacity to adapt to new realities. The world changed, changes and will constantly change, which is why we must continually update our concepts. But as we said before, our competitive capacity will be much greater if we are the generators of this new reality, that is, instead of reacting or anticipating changes in the environment, we have to have the imagination and the creative capacity to bring about change with new concepts. and ideas.
We must therefore accept that everything changes. As the Greek philosopher Heraclitus said "existence is the current of a river, in which we cannot bathe twice in the same waters." But while change has always existed, there are phases in history in which such changes accelerate, and we are currently going through one of those moments of strong acceleration.
What are those radical changes to which we must rearrange our ways of thinking, and therefore the way to establish strategies? If until yesterday our strategies were adapted to certain rules of the game, today by changing these rules we must change the strategies to be used.
In the first place we have the fall of what for a long time was considered impregnable, which was the fall of the communist system. This brought with it important population movements, in the appearance of new competitors both when it comes to offering products and services, and when receiving investments, in the expansion of markets, in the appearance of two huge colossi in the markets, such as they are mainland china and russia. At the same time, many countries that are separated from both the communist and the Soviet bloc become part of the European Union, which means for its economic power.
The fall of communism also meant the termination of ideological struggles, leading to strong industrial and commercial growth in Southeast Asia. So today the strong growth of Indonesia, the Philippines, Malaysia, Thailand, and even Vietnam is accompanying South Korea, Hong Kong, Singapore and Taiwan. If you add to these countries Mainland China, plus the awakening of India (a country whose projections aim to exceed the population of China itself in 15 years) we have the appearance of new supermarkets, both at the time of place products, such as when competing. Countries that lack a union history that limits them in regulatory matters, countries with strong needs for growth and development to feed a large human mass,They offer us the ability to generate goods with a very low cost of labor.
To this must be added the phenomenal fall in the costs of both transport and communications, as a result of new technologies. We must add to this the appearance of new materials arising from materials engineering, which replace natural products such as basic minerals and products derived from animals. No less auspicious is the advancement of the application of genetics and biotechnologies to agricultural development, which generates higher productive yields per hectare, in addition to the possibility of producing in climates and soil types that up to now have been unsuitable or with low yields..
Another fundamental aspect is the computer revolution that allows fast and extensive communications at a low cost, and in an increasingly efficient way. In addition, teleinformatics has allowed both the emergence of virtual companies, as well as teleworking (also called remote work). Remote work makes it possible for professionals, service companies and individuals in general to produce services from their place of residence and market them in very distant places. Today remote surgical operations are already being carried out, or information is being processed in one country and the results are being transferred to a distant country, among many more alternatives that are taking place today.
The recognition of these profound changes implies the need not only for profound modifications in national strategies, but also in those of companies.
One of the great changes to take place revolves around the generation of energy based on hydrogen, through the separation of the molecules that make up the water. In the same way, there are already important advances not only on the scientific level, but also on the technical and commercial level for water desalination. In this way, those countries that until now obtain strong income from oil income will see their financial resources fall greatly. For many of these countries today possessing extensive desert areas, the strategy would be given by the use of their current oil income in the process of developing desalination plants that allow agricultural production to support their populations.
In addition to all that has been described, there is the fall of customs barriers and the emergence of a gigantic international capital market, in which the so-called emerging countries participate, in addition to the central countries, facilitated by modern information systems, which generates huge movements of capital between countries, as well as the appearance of strong currency and currency crises (Mexico, Brazil, Southeast Asia, Russia, Argentina).
Thus we have that these great changes worldwide that resemble great movements and continental movements, generate the strong need to rethink the strategies of the company linked to both marketing, finance, costs and production, as well as research and development.. Today, it no longer competes only with inventors, creators and innovators from Europe, Japan, the United States and Canada, but also with the millions of creatives in China, India, Korea, Brazil and Southeast Asia. Just think of automotive and electronics brands from India and South Korea until recently unthinkable in the West and today come true.
Today the competitive capacity of a nation is no longer given by its natural resources, but by its knowledge, and its ability to generate new marketable ideas in the markets.
Thus, companies see the urgent need to add new values to their products and services every day to differentiate them from competitors. The differences will be due to better quality levels, lower costs, speed of attention, responsiveness, total customer satisfaction, and diversification capacity (adaptation to particular segments instead of general standards).
6. Imagine the future
To imagine is to ideally represent or create something. This is how those leaders who seek to achieve the success of their companies should think and rethink the near and distant future. Thinking and rethinking, constantly creating and recreating the present and future of companies is the duty of managers. To think that repeating what previously led to victory will generate it again in the present and in the future is a very serious mistake. To continue managing the company with the concepts that corresponded to other political, social, economic, technological, and scientific realities constitutes a huge and serious mistake. A wrong manager cannot run a company, it is like a compass that does not work, it inevitably leads the corporation to a gorge.It is not possible to solve important problems at the same level of thinking at which those problems have arisen. To solve a problem that seems to have no solution, it is necessary first of all to change the level of thought, that is, to change the paradigm. To each new problem corresponds a new vision of the world, that is, a new paradigm. This brings up another important fact: "by changing the paradigm, prior knowledge is useless."
The new leader, the leader for this new era of globalized business, needs not only reasoning capacity and logical-quantitative analysis, but must also have the capacity of imagination and intuition sufficient to generate new ideas, drive innovation and creative solve. and effectively the problems generated by the new realities. A new environment will give rise to new problems, problems whose very existence, and therefore solutions, were not seen either in the university or in their previous experience.
7. Re-educate managers and staff
Our brain is made up of two hemispheres: the left and the right. As a general rule, the education they give us at school privileges the development of the left hemisphere, which is the logical and analytical part of the brain. The right hemisphere, where intuition and creativity reside, is in the background in the intellectual development of the student. Outcome? We learn to think with only one side of the brain, and we do not take full advantage of the capacity of our brain.
While the left side of the brain concentrates on: the detail, the mechanics, the substance, in black and white, the language, it is logical, closed, cautious, skeptical, repetitive, verbal, analytical and memory, the right side is concentrated In: breadth, creativity, essence, colors, it is receptive, artistic, open, adventurous, innovative, intuitive, synthetic, spatial and meditative.
The left and right hemispheres have totally different functions, they process information differently, but they are complementary. Success depends on the two hemispheres of the brain working in balance and harmony. Just as the human being needs two legs in perfect condition to walk and run, something similar happens with the brain. Therefore, not only must the contents of primary, secondary and university education be rethought, but in the meantime it is essential to re-educate our managers and staff. Between two companies, the one with the most intuitive and creative personnel will have the advantage of obtaining an advantage in the markets.
- Creating new paradigms
If the managers and managers are not prepared to identify and take advantage of an opportunity, surely another will do it for them: someone better prepared, who goes beyond me when others simply watch, someone who has succeeded in changing their paradigm.
The paradigm explains what the world is like, and with it, helps us to predict its behavior. The paradigm is for the human being what water is for the fish, which does not know that it lives inside it until they take it out. Education and society make us see the world in a massive, standard way. Fashion tells us how to dress; advertising, what to consume. The world influences our way of thinking, creating and strengthening paradigms in our minds. The entrepreneur and manager who manages to change this state of affairs and modify their paradigms, will begin to see what others do not see, and then opportunities will arise to achieve success.
Knowing the paradigms is essential for business. Switzerland is a country known for its watches. In 1970, Switzerland controlled 90% of the world watch market. One day a technician from one of the largest watchmaking companies showed his bosses a new model he had just invented. It was an electronic quartz watch. His superior looked at the prototype and said: “This is not a watch. It has no springs or rubies, ”and he did not attach any importance to the discovery. But the Japanese and the Americans did. And the whole world too. They put the quartz watch up for sale, and in 1982, 90% of the market controlled by the Swiss dropped to 15%. They lost leadership and fifty thousand jobs because of the new technology, invented by a Swiss!The problem is that when technology is changed - in the Swiss case, from mechanical to electronic clocks - the previous technology, acquired through years of efforts and research, turns into smoke. You have to start again, and that's why it's so difficult to change. But the world market is extremely competitive. A company that takes time to change its paradigm loses market in favor of another that changes faster. The world is in permanent transformation, or companies change with it, or tend to lag behind.A company that takes time to change its paradigm loses market in favor of another that changes faster. The world is in permanent transformation, or companies change with it, or tend to lag behind.A company that takes time to change its paradigm loses market in favor of another that changes faster. The world is in permanent transformation, or companies change with it, or tend to lag behind.
For companies, as well as for managers and professionals, it is much easier to continue with the old world view, doing what has always been done, than adopting a new one and doing what has not yet been learned. The problem is that people live immersed in their own paradigm and do not realize it.
Another way to explain paradigms is to consider them as maps. We all know that "the map is not the territory." A map is simply an explanation of certain aspects of a territory. A paradigm is exactly that. It is a theory, an explanation, or a model of something else. We all have a lot of maps in mind, which can be classified into two main categories: maps the way things are, or realities, and maps the way they should be, or values. With those mental maps we interpret everything we experience. We rarely question its accuracy; usually we are not even aware that they exist. We simply assume that the way we see things corresponds to what they really are or what they should be. These assumptions give rise to our attitudes and our behavior.The way we see things is the source of the way we think and the way we act.
9. The Fosbury Effect
For many years the most common way to perform the high jump was the "roller jump": the athlete ran up to the bar and launched himself in a rolling motion. During the games held in Mexico during 1968, the athlete Dick Fosbury surprised the world by establishing a new Olympic brand and winning the gold medal with a new technique he had worked on for several years: the "Fosbury jump" consisting of running towards the bar and pass it by jumping on your back. Fosbury "changed the model" in the high jump, replaced a model by a new one in its entirety. Applying these concepts to the area of production, administration and business management, this implies that it is necessary to adopt new techniques if you want to keep the company in competition,Perfecting old methods no longer works.
Now let's look at an industrial level case. The price of picture tubes for televisions followed the pattern of the experience curve from the introduction of television in the late 1940s to 1963. The average unit price at the time fell from US $ 34 to US $ 34. S 8 (price of the dollar in 1958). The arrival of color television interrupted the experience curve. The manufacture of picture tubes for color devices required new manufacturing technology, and the price of these tubes rose to $ 51 in 1966. Then the experience curve reaffirmed itself, The price dropped to US $ 48 in 1968, US $ 37 in 1970 and US $ 36 in 1972. In short, technological change can alter the rules of the game,by requiring former low-cost carriers to take steps to restore their competitive advantage.
- The capacity for permanent change
Life is a river, and every day we all have to make a decision about how we will navigate it. The way the river runs is changing. In the past, the river was generally calm, fairly predictable, and moderately manageable. But the river of the future is more turbulent, generally unpredictable, and much less manageable. Our river current is changing, and our navigation should also change; Because life in that new river means that we have to learn, not only to wait for changes and respond to them, but also to imagine and create them. This new way of analyzing and making decisions is called Positive Uncertainty for times of change. Uncertainty represents the condition of the river of life today. Whoever makes the decisions successfully when navigating that stream needs to be understanding,accepting and positive about that uncertainty. The modern world, like the river of today, is constantly changing. The decision maker of this new era must be able to change, just as the environment does. We know how to make rational, linear decisions for a calm and predictable river, but do we know how to handle the extraordinarily complicated and random parts of a turbulent river? We need some strategies that are not rational, that are not linear. We require decisive tactics for both stability and the unexpected; we need the knowledge and attitudes to handle both order and chaos, stability and inconsistency. We need flexibility and balance.The decision maker of this new era must be able to change, just as the environment does. We know how to make rational, linear decisions for a calm and predictable river, but do we know how to handle the extraordinarily complicated and random parts of a turbulent river? We need some strategies that are not rational, that are not linear. We require decisive tactics for both stability and the unexpected; we need the knowledge and attitudes to handle both order and chaos, stability and inconsistency. We need flexibility and balance.The decision maker of this new era must be able to change, just as the environment does. We know how to make rational, linear decisions for a calm and predictable river, but do we know how to handle the extraordinarily complicated and random parts of a turbulent river? We need some strategies that are not rational, that are not linear. We require decisive tactics for both stability and the unexpected; we need the knowledge and attitudes to handle both order and chaos, stability and inconsistency. We need flexibility and balance.But do we know how to handle the extraordinarily complicated and random parts of a turbulent river? We need some strategies that are not rational, that are not linear. We require decisive tactics for both stability and the unexpected; we need the knowledge and attitudes to handle both order and chaos, stability and inconsistency. We need flexibility and balance.But do we know how to handle the extraordinarily complicated and random parts of a turbulent river? We need some strategies that are not rational, that are not linear. We require decisive tactics for both stability and the unexpected; we need the knowledge and attitudes to handle both order and chaos, stability and inconsistency. We need flexibility and balance.
The world is becoming more turbulent every day, and we must quickly learn to deal with it. In a world with new rules of the game, whoever does not modify their game strategies to these new circumstances will cease to be competitive, will go into the background, and will risk disappearing.
11. Ethics and morals
In a constantly changing world, ethical and moral paradigms change as a result of the new visions and values that man is adopting. On the other hand, what results in moral conduct for a certain civilization or culture at a given moment may be immoral in another civilization or moment. This is of fundamental importance in the globalized economy, since managers in constant interaction with agents from other nations or countries must be able to recognize the differences in paradigms in order to improve their business relationships.
Regarding the change in the rules, an entrepreneur or manager can change the rules regarding the ways of seeing or marketing a product, or the way of processing or designing it. But it cannot change the internal feelings of consumers, customers, employees and the community as a whole. You should always be alert, trying to avoid colliding with social thought regarding moral values, respecting freedom of conscience. You should bear in mind that business ethics is becoming a component of greater importance every day, due to the importance it has in respect of the environment, as well as the speed with which misconduct is made known through of current information systems.
12. The paradigm shift as a strategy
The constant revision of our paradigms, analyzing how much they agree with reality, with the changes in the environment, and with our possibilities of subsistence, become a fundamental methodology when planning competitive strategies. Recall the cases discussed above around the color television or quartz watches. It would only suffice to mention Mr. Fosbury when instead of performing high jump with the roller method (paradigm existing at the time) he decided to change it by jumping on his back. His competitors were not prepared for something like that, the regulations did not prohibit such a jump, conclusion Fosbury not only stayed with the golden medal, but also broke a new Olympic record and set a new standard.
Do you think as an entrepreneur, manager or professional that another way you can carry out a process, product or service, or imagine what new product or service you can offer. Think about those rules that you follow but are not obliged to respect, those other ways in which you can design your business. In it you will find the total competitive advantage. You will have in your hands the possibility of setting the new rules, instead of sticking to the already set rules. Think about how you can run or conduct a business based on your strengths and the weaknesses of your opponents.
13. NLP as a tool to modify beliefs
Neurolinguistic Programming (NLP) is the study of the factors that influence our way of thinking, communicating and behaving. It is a way of encoding and reproducing excellence and allows us to consistently obtain the results we desire in our life, work or company.
The business world is changing at such rapid pace that the demand for specialization has been replaced by that of learning and differentiation. Every day there are more entities interested in creating a decent organization: an organization capable of learning, in which the individuals who compose it manage their own development, learn to deploy their skills and exploit their potential to the fullest. However, this cannot be accomplished with past methods. If you continue doing the usual, you'll end up just like always! The key to the future lies with individuals. The ability to manage your thoughts, resolve conflicts and perceive experiences will ultimately be what makes the difference between those individuals and organizations that are making their way to a new, interesting, creative and cooperative future.and those who stay in the lurch.
Today, many of the books devoted to the future of business mean that companies need extensive restructuring work. But the secret does not lie in renewing the structure of the organization, but in reprogramming the way of thinking and the attitudes of the individuals that comprise it. The culture of an organization is the expression of the people who make it up, especially those who run it. The way of thinking of a leader will inevitably become the guidelines of the organization of which he is a part.
Beliefs or paradigms are points of view that people hold about their people, others or the world around them, and that determine the decisions they make and how they behave in each situation. The magic of NLP (Neurolinguistic Programming) is that it allows people to modify their paradigms and adopt others that support the way of being they want. There are several ways that NLP can help people change their beliefs. One of them is for the person to assume that they have these beliefs, which despite being new, are more in line with the way of being that you want. Another technique is to allow people to rewrite their personal stories. Since the unconscious does not know the difference between the real and the imaginary,It is possible to imagine the past that they would have liked to have and readjust their memories.
14. Conclusions
A business leader who does not feel that the earth is moving under his feet, is living in the past and is not ready for the future. We are currently experiencing dynamic differences in all aspects of the business enterprise, differences that affect the permanence of our companies and our positions within them. As time passes, these differences increase in frequency and intensity until obtaining almost seismic proportions. Evidence of change in the business sector surrounds each of us, regardless of our industry or the role we play in it. We see impressive technological changes that have occurred thanks to microfiche, laser beam, genetic engineering, and the industrialization of space. Social changes abound, including the dissolution of the family nucleus,the changing roles that women are playing, the aging of the population in the central countries, the revolution in good health and the decentralization of institutions. On the productive side, new processes and goods have emerged, and in the case of the latter subject to increasingly accelerated life cycles.
Analyze and adopt decisions based on paradigms or concepts that do not correspond to the new needs of the market, to the new ways of processing goods and services, which do not agree with the current needs of consumers in terms of added value, which do not allow to make effective decisions in economic and financial matters, is to mismanage the company. For this, managers must not only readapt their concepts, but must continually review these concepts to not only keep up with the paradigms, but also adopt proactive attitudes that allow them to generate the new rules that will dominate the market.
Technicians, professionals, managers and leaders must not only possess the most up-to-date and in-depth technical knowledge, but also possess knowledge that makes a difference with their rivals and competitors. They must acquire knowledge in Neurolinguistic Programming, Lateral Thinking, Creativity, Imagination, Innovation, Systemic Thinking, Quantum Administration, Emotional Intelligence, and Intuition. Those who think that in the 21st century it can be administered using only one side of the brain are wasting the great differentiating potential of the right side of the brain. The Japanese call waste a dumb, one might wonder how much you and your company waste the intuitive, creative, imaginative and innovative capacities,and who is so concerned with developing and accommodating them in their business plans and strategies.
15. Bibliography
- NLP - The new science of personal excellence - Alder, Harry - EDAF - 1996Creative decision-making - Gelatt, HB - Editorial Iberoamerica - 1991The 7 habits of effective people - Covey, Stephen R. - Pious - 1989The strategy of change - Gilbreath, Robert D. - McGraw Hill - 1987 NLP at Work - Knight, Sue - Syrian Publishing - 1995 Creation of Models with NLP - Dilts, Robert B. - Uranus Publishing - 1999 The Mind of the Strategist - Ohmae, Kenichi - McGraw Hill - 1982 Paradigms - Barker, Joel Arthur - McGraw Hill - 2000The Fifth Discipline - Senge, Peter M. - Granica - 1996
