We are on the cusp of a fundamental change — a worldwide change in the skills everyone needs to succeed, in the nature of organizations, and in how businesses must be led.
The agricultural revolution set up a pattern that still exists today. A small surplus meant that only a small elite could create culture and control resources. But in 1700, a different force emerged. A more open architecture developed in Northern Europe, where better ideas were rewarded and entrepreneurial innovation was born. This allowed the West to break out of 1,200 years of stagnation. Average per capita income rose 20% in the 1700s, 200% in the 1800s, and 740% in the last century, and the world — especially the pioneering world of business and commerce — was forever changed.
This progress seemed to have bypassed the public sector — government, foundations, and nonprofit organizations. Here there was no competition, so a huge productivity gap opened between the private sector and the public sector, with the latter characterized by low performance, dismal pay, and low self-esteem.
In 1980, however, a new citizen sector began to make the leap to the entrepreneurial architecture of the private sector. Government agencies and traditional charities and philanthropies no longer monopolized the world’s efforts to solve social problems. Social entrepreneurs emerged with new system-changing ideas. Ashoka has invested in more than 2,700 of these entrepreneurs from every part of the world. We have supported and witnessed the game-changing effects they have had in area after area. (More than half of these start-ups change national policy within five years.) Consequently, the citizen sector is halving the gap between its productivity level and that of business every 10 to 12 years. In fact, the sector is now generating jobs two-and-a-half to three times as fast as business is.
We are transitioning from a world in which a small elite runs everything to a world in which everyone needs to be a player. Don’t take our word for it. Look around you. Which organizations, cities, and institutions are leading the pack? Where are the smart and capable people migrating?
Fifty years ago, Detroit was the symbol of American ingenuity and prosperity. Henry Ford and his small group of managers did all the thinking and told everyone else what to do. This command-and-control approach works in a relatively static world where most tasks are repetitive — such as building cars on an assembly line. It does not work in today’s fast-paced, change-is-the-name-of-the-game world; and it will not work tomorrow.
Compare once-powerful Detroit to Silicon Valley. There, people recognize that the most powerful thing in this new world is a good idea in the hands of a capable entrepreneur. Companies like Google and Apple are attracting great thinkers and doers — not because they promise to tell their employees what to do but precisely because they pledge to give them the autonomy to do what they are best at and to act as critical players no matter their position in the organizational structure. There, anyone and everyone can be a changemaker. That doesn’t mean they will be or that the Valley doesn’t have its problems (housing for one). But if you want to know what our world is going to look like in 10 or 15 years, who will be thriving, and who just won’t cut it, study Silicon Valley.
To be effective in this new world, you will need to master the skills of empathy and teamwork, as well as leadership and driving change. You will need to know how to function in a world that is not a hierarchy but a kaleidoscopic global team of teams, with no boundaries between sectors and change that happens at an escalating pace.
This is a rare moment in history. Are you ready to be a changemaker in the private sector, the citizen sector, or both? Do you and your employees have the necessary skills? How will you and your organization fit in this new world?
Bill Drayton is the founder, chairman and CEO of Ashoka: Innovators for the Public. Since 1980, Ashoka has helped social entrepreneurs develop, share, and scale their ideas. Valeria Budinich leads Ashoka’s worldwide efforts to forge profitable alliances between private companies and citizen-sector organizations.
