Necessity is the mother of all invention.
Ten years ago, there was no Facebook. Twenty years before that, the iPad was not in existence. Thirty years prior to that, Facebook or iPad, you couldn’t access any.
What do Facebook, the iPad and the internet have in common? At inception, they seemed to be the craziest ideas anyone could come up with. Today, concepts which began in the safe confines of a dreamer’s mind are explored and expanded by billions of us.
All things are changing around us, and it is only the careless manager who fails to prepare for the inevitable, or meet evolving circumstances with brave preparedness.
The world has become an ever-moving automobile, and you’d better be prepared with your business gadgets, tools and concepts and approaches, or you’d soon be left behind, staring blankly and wide-eyed at the settling dust on the departed automobile’s route.
Innovation is on the move.
New ways are being developed in all sectors to do things better, to change how we see the world, how we move, how we interact, where we interact. Everybody’s in a hurry to leave today behind for tomorrow – the future of NOW, the birth-place of its solutions.
Workplace
The work environment has changed radically from what it once was. Portfolios are being created on the go. Work has gradually changed from a place to an event. It is no longer a matter of where you are physically located but what you do there. No longer a where, but a what. It’s changed from a noun to a verb. So the webmaster of Twitter Inc. could well at this minute be monitoring events from his toilet seat, or from the dark corridors of a movie theatre. You no longer have to brush up, dress up, drive for 4 merciless hours through Lagos traffic, and get on a place to South Africa, simply to stand before a projector screen and a band of tired executives when the send button is simply a button away.
Legal
In the Legal world, traditional law firms with their mountainous loads of briefs and abstract drafts are watching as the widespread paper craze is diminishing before their very eyes. Huge libraries are being discarded for desktop document folders, and telecommuting is overtaking boardroom gathering.
The world has changed drastically from what it once 50 years ago. Put simply, the Future got impatient in its waiting room and has started banging relentlessly on the doors of the Present. Artificial intelligence, an original favourite of Hollywood and doomsday prophets, has come to stay. In 2017, Sophia (the robot) spoke at a United Nations Conference, exchanged tweets with Tesla’s CEO, Elon Musk, and attained Saudi Arabia citizenship.
Conclusion.
These are interesting times. For the world. For us all.
The world out there rings no alarms before it picks itself up and zooms in the direction of tomorrow.
We are all aware.
But what are we doing about that?
Are we as anticipatory as survival screams that we are?
Gbolahan Olayemi
In 2016, I caught the Legal Tech Innovation bug, and I've not remained the same since. When I'm not pursuing dreams, I'm writing, researching, making music, or designing brands.