As people working in the IT industry, embracing change will likely be the best way for us to continue surviving and thriving in our environment.
How much change have we witnessed just in technology the last seventeen years? Do you remember when everyone was freaking out about Y2K on the eve of the year 2000? How far has the world of technology come since then? Though I was only 15 at the time, I can clearly remember so many massive technological breakthroughs there have been since… and they weren’t all coming from Steve Jobs, but various people.
The Internet of things today may be seen as a status quo now, but there is always a catalyst that brings us to a new mode of life, one that soon becomes an accepted standard. But how did we get here? You’ve got it… by accepting change (and most of the time, we don’t have a choice)!
If you were born in the 90s or before, you’ll likely remember when people simply communicated via a house phone, AIM chats, and what today would seem like rudimentary and antiquated forms of communication and information sharing. Nowadays, my 11-year old nephew in Spain knows how to do graphic design and has multiple accounts on various websites where he learns new things by the minute, and my other nephews and nieces have been using tablets since the age of 6 or earlier. And on the other end of the spectrum of age, my eighty year-old uncles and aunts in Spain and the U.S. (both sides of my family), are writing me messages on my Facebook wall to congratulate me on having recently established a wedding date and wedding location with my fiancée.
This specific process of change detailed above, and the technology revolution, which started way before the year 2000, is now becoming the standard. And at some point, we’ve all had to learn to accept this technology revolution, and grow with it.
You may be thinking to yourself, “Well it’s easy to accept this type of change if you’re one of those people who feels ‘naked’ when they accidentally leave their iPhone at home”. Well, on a personal note, I’m not one of those people that you find outside on a sunny day staring at their iPhone, smartphone, tablet or whatever. When I leave my home or the office, I enjoy being a silent observer that absorbs all that is going on around me, without a device. In fact, my Mom is driving me crazy on a monthly basis for the past year or two because I don’t want to download WhatsApp – I’m averse to this change! Trust me, I’m more for changing how people use technology then to continue the current state of obsession with technology. But no matter what, the constant here is that change benefits us all in the long-run in different ways, and we all adjust accordingly.
But what is it that brings about such revolutionary change? In a word: us. Because without change, we cease to evolve, we cease to progress. And yet, at times, change can be a way to retrogress, because as history has taught us, not all change is good. But even when change proves to be something that isn’t beneficial, it occurs only to be the catalyst for better change in the future.
Therefore, fellow IT pundits, aficionados, and business people alike, let’s embrace the changes in our industry that are yet to come in 2017, and let’s work together to make inevitable change positive.
I hope you all have a happy holiday season, and a Happy New Year! I look forward to seeing your interpretation of “change” below.