Time has come where-in we try and visualize what this year has unfolded to us. As we leap our way forward into 2022, with the common aspiration of making it there, the difference lies only in the ways each of us would be navigating there. Some will have happiness & joy, celebrations raining & ringing into the countdown, others – memories which they had shared with their loved ones lost in the year that passed by & with a hope that this one goes by normally. No matter what the event(s) or memories, there’ll always be a common goal to – to get to 2022.
New year is the time for new resolutions – or is it?
For me, the year started off with a continuous learning cycle – focusing on a new way of thinking – this was a great start to visualize & perceive an already existing phenomenon but less noticeable although having a larger impact when imbibed in the day-to-day culture of approach. Time has come to reflect a bit on it. Algorithmic thinking or thinking with the right level of detail is powerful in itself because it can carry the picture to move forward irrespective of what if any event might occur which might try to distort the objectives – short term or long term. This program ended post a 6-week session but for me, it kind of never ended as there were opportunities always to re-think and apply the methodologies to an existing process to make it more refined, it was, as some might call something which was continuous learning where the Lego blocks are purposely given to build the picture and see if there is a better one which is possible.
This did bring to the realization – that we are living in a dynamic world, change is the only constant and learning to focus on that change from an individualistic purpose is not just learning for the sake of learning but learning to apply. You’ve got to ask that question again and again to yourself –
- what is this learning going to do for me?
- & have I got a way to measure the return on it? (which, also means how much you have applied it in the right way possible)
Which does bring back to the question – have we learnt anything from what happened in the year that unveiled a completely different picture to us? Well, to be frank, there will be those that are still passerby-s & say it was unusual and wait for it to get back to normal & there will be others who will acknowledge that life can change with an event which was never planned for correctly and try to find ways to plan it better but the fact remains – we are living in a dynamic world, events will happen and unfortunately technology has adapt to focus on those events and make them normalized for any type of anomaly which can occur.
What does this mean to us? – For sure, one thing, we have to change our way of thinking, the way to move forward is probably not based on the methods & techniques of last two decades but is evolving to shape up for advancements many times more. In some ways it’s like a fission reaction – which needs the right amount of balance to continue forward and if not approach with intended phased governance processes might lead to levels of mammoth sink holes creating an overall imbalance. This might be a very high level perception but what does that mean for us – a) we have to acknowledge the fact that we are already past that time when only humans could be a part of working and decisioning process, which means we need to continuously start thinking on human-machine interaction, working hand in hand & b) we need re-position our methodology to achieve a long term un-biased work expectation from a human-machine interaction, which also means going down to the extent at which machine comprehends and starts to decision in the right way.
Question is – how can we achieve this?
Well, first step is to be aware – which might sound a bit confusing, but if we look at our everyday life, most of our day-to-day activities are based out of approach from the sub-conscious, but probably not laid out in the way that you could always clearly say or point to them in a stepwise fashion.
Say for example – if we are going to a super-market to purchase food, we might be making a list of things needed but those are core-necessities and probably not linked to the complete picture of the diet, the probabilities of eating out or maybe having a scheduled overtime running out causing us to keep a stock of some more or less items than what we think might be needed. We try to adjust around the way what we bought more and never plan to bring the right stuff in first place. Well, if you had the steps and associations marked, this would have been easy & so would have been the permutation and combination for it. So, the basic question is to start thinking on the breakdown first, and to do that – it is essential to understand what constitutes a breakdown and what doesn’t (more on this later). This also involves – the heating and cooling cycles for an individual or group focusing on the activity at hand and imbibes into the bigger picture of activities which shape humanity – like the carbon footprint.
The second step is to understand what is essential and what is not & prioritize - basics but often not followed as much.
In this regard - I often like to use the terminology of grading experiments on ISS - anything out of the plan and sweeping in - you've got to ask that question - is this a need, a want or a desire?
- if it's a need - it's gotta be having a justification which may be return or essentiality focussed, for e.g. - drinking water.
- if it's a want - it's gotta be having some lower level prioritization, for e.g. - condiments.
- if it's a desire - then you might or might not wanna factor that into the plan, for e.g. - added bag of chips.
At any point - it is critical & essential to factor in the what kind of a prioritization is coming in place for both a planned or un-planned item.
This past year – gave me an opportunity to dwell on some of these steps – to be aware – to understand what is key and what is changeable in terms of the day to day activities, to see if there was an opportunity to control or contribute to the overall picture (like the carbon footprint contribution) but most of all – the realization that considering the impact of what each one of us is consistently working on can never be completed until and unless we all have a common goal or goals and right governance in place.
(PS: All thoughts are my own and don't represent any organizational policies and procedures. References only to nasa ISS experiments grading system)
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