Tropophilia: Once In A Life Time Opportunity!

Yes, it is the biggest opportunity in at least 70 years for organizations to truly transform themselves.

The last big opportunity was in the 1950s, when IBM saw the urgent need to gain agility in the face of uncertainty, which the world had never experienced before, unfortunately, their good intentions were highjacked by failed schemes devised by “experts” and the endless “re-engineering” flop.

In 2020, the pandemic catalyzed a major organizational transformation at the global level by forcing organizations to accept employees working from home. Yet, most organizations seemed reluctant to do it, or did it by force and not by choice. Therefore, missing out the greatest opportunity for a truly sustainable organizational transformation from its core up.

I recently came across an article from Knowldge@Wharton where professor Capelli talks about the “Future of the office.” Professor Capelli states that “ Choices create problems” which is only true when these choices are forced upon us. However, when we make a choice, we should do it based on our implicit understanding that we will have to face the consequences of that choice and, therefore, we better make sure that choice is properly studied.

The opportunity to work from home not only sounds like a great thing but could be a great thing if employers not only allow it to be so but embrace it as a catalyst for a truly sustainable organizational transformation.

Professor Capelli further states “Why not give everybody opportunities?” Yes, giving everybody opportunities imply making a choice and making choices matters a lot because every choice has a consequence and sometimes these consequences can be life-changing.

For the past seven decades, however, these choices have not been made by the employees but by the employers with little or no skin in the game, i.e., a nominal consent from employees who have to face most of the brunt from the consequences of these choices.

This is patently evident by the fact that most organizations still rely on supervisors!

Think about, why do organizations choose to have supervisors?

It has become common place to hear organizations state “we do not micro-mange,” yet they…