Speed Beyond Humans, #16

In April 1860, the Pony Express thundered out of St. Joseph, Missouri, with eighty riders, 400 horses, and 190 relay stations stretching nearly 2,000 miles to Sacramento. Stations were placed every 10–15 miles—the distance a horse could run before exhaustion. Riders, mostly wiry teenagers, leapt from one steaming horse onto a fresh mount in less than two minutes and carried on at full gallop. A mochila—leather saddle cover with locked mail pouches—was thrown across the saddle, carrying the nation’s most urgent communications.

The Pony Express cut mail delivery from weeks to ten days. It carried Lincoln’s inaugural address west and California’s gold rush news east. 

It was a marvel of daring and planning: synchronized stations, recovery schedules for horses and riders, and a rhythm of endurance and precision.

And then, in October 1861, the telegraph lines met in Salt Lake City.

Messages now moved at the speed of electricity. In an instant, the Pony Express was obsolete. Not in a generation. Not in a decade. In just eighteen months.

That is the first leadership lesson of speed: no matter how brave your riders or how fine your horses, once the tempo of technology outruns human capability, courage is irrelevant. Only redesign matters.

The Hidden Currency of Change: Transformational Energy

Throughout history, both organizations and societies have grappled with the consequences of rapid change. Consider the Gutenberg printing press.  Johannes Gutenberg's invention of the printing press in the mid-15th century created all kinds of rapid, unforeseen and unintended consequences. It democratized information, enabled the rapid dissemination of it, and disrupted all kinds of established power structures and belief systems. 

Prior to the printing press, knowledge dissemination was slow, controlled and often only available to an elite few. The printing press significantly lowered barriers to entry, empowering individuals, and smaller organizations to challenge established players and dogma. For example, the printing press weakened the Church's monopoly on knowledge and fueled the Protestant Reformation, which led to social unrest, wars and calls for change, as seen in the religious turmoil following Gutenberg's invention.

Fast forward centuries, and we see another example with the Industrial Revolution. While it sparked incredible innovation and economic growth, the rapid pace of change left many behind. The rise of factories led to harsh working conditions, displacing traditional artisans, and fueling social movements like Luddism, where workers protested the perceived threat of technology to their livelihoods. These historical examples illustrate the importance of managing change effectively. When change happens too quickly, it can lead to societal discord and organizational exhaustion. In today's world of constant change and innovation, understanding and managing our collective "transformational energy" is more crucial than ever.

Future Catalysts that Just Might Change Us

A catalyst, in futurist-speak, is a time or event that is so influential that it causes a society to rethink - how they think.  A review of history reveals that our thinking has been shaped by numerous catalysts over time. These major disruptions to our status quo-thinking forced us to reevaluate our beliefs and behaviors, and to ponder new paradigms of thought and action. As we look to the future, several potential catalysts loom on the horizon, each with the power to fundamentally reshape our future and challenge our collective mindset.

Advances in Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Automation

AI and automation technologies promises to redefine the nature of work, creativity, and human interaction. As these technologies become increasingly integrated into daily life, we face questions about the value of human labor, the ethics of AI decision-making, and the distribution of wealth in a post-work society. The rise of AI could lead to a significant shift in societal values, prioritizing continuous learning, adaptability, and a reevaluation of what it means to think, work and to lead a fulfilling life.

How Beliefs Influence the Future

As a futurist, I spend a lot of time studying history.  Why?  As Aerosmith frontman, Steven Tyler sings, "We are all somebody from somewhere."  And that somewhere is often revealing.  We can see patterns in history.  Patterns that just might extend from the past to the future.  

One of the surprises of history is what historians refer to as the, "Special Century."  From 1870-1970 massive improvements in the standard of living were achieved across many regions of the world all at the same time.  These levels of improvements had never been seen before. During this period, we went from riding horses to landing on the moon!

A look at the history of technology and we see that during one 5 year period during the Special Century, 1875-1880, telephones, internal combustion engines, electric light bulbs and phonographs were all created.  During another 5 year span, 1900-1905, we invented the radio, air conditioning, vacuums and airplane flight!  Huge inventions that are still in our lives today.

When the World Changed - Art and AI

In this episode, artist and podcaster, April Harris, shares her thoughts and feelings as generative AI changes the world around her.  Join us as we dig deep into the impact AI will have on the world of art.

*I use generative AI to assist in all my work.

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Kevin Benedict

Futurist at TCS

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***Full Disclosure: These are my personal opinions. No company is silly enough to claim them. I work with and have worked with many of the companies mentioned in my articles.

A Digital Leader's Playbook

Digital Strategies

Winners know how to win. When competition, data and/or rules change, so do their game plans.  Recently while watching NFL football, I was intrigued by a discussion between analyst about how the best coaches can change their strategies mid-game based on new and different data.  Some coaches are able to pivot, others can't.  

What follows is a list of key strategies, concepts and mindsets that will help your enterprise win:

Measuring Enterprises' Capacity for Change

Change is difficult.  The default mode of most organizations and people is to resist change.  It's like a helmsman who steers a ship straight into an iceberg because he doesn't want to rock the boat.

Agile businesses, however, that can redirect energy to fast and positive change and transformation can exploit many more opportunities than enterprises mired in resistance.  The challenge for leaders today is to create an organization that is not only prepared and willing to change, but that also has enough energy and resources to succeed.

One of the rules of the First Law of Thermodynamics in physics is, "Energy can be changed from one form to another, but it cannot be created or destroyed.”  I propose there is an application of this rule in business as well.  If energy is being consumed on resisting changes to your business, then it is not available for making positive changes to your business.

If markets are changing due to economic conditions, competition, technological innovations or rapidly changing customer behaviors and preferences, then companies must be able to quickly redirect their energy to implementing positive change in order to win.

Change consumes energy, and energy is finite.  That means in order to make changes to keep up with a rapidly changing market, energy must be conserved and stock piled so it is available.  Expending scarce energy resisting intelligent change is a huge waste.  Making investments and taking your business down a path that cannot quickly be undone if the market moves a new direction is also a big waste.