Today’s digital technologies are requiring us to learn new knowledge and perspectives – and fast. As new technologies emerge every week, our existing technologies continue to evolve and become more powerful. Ironically, if we want to grow and adapt to these changes, we need to learn how to unlearn. How can organisations navigate this shift and ensure their competitive edge stays sharp?

How different would the world be if nothing was immortalised with the written word? Would we have been able to achieve the technological progress we have, if we couldn’t learn from the brilliant thinkers that went before us? In the man-made world around us, every engineering feat and design marvel, first originated in the imagination of someone. It is a collection of manifested ideas; a myriad coming from the minds and pens of science fiction writers.

It is somewhere out there. Out of sight, out of smell, and so far out of mind that we can measure it in light years. Regardless, it demands its pound of flesh and what it spares us in head space, it exacts from just about everything else we hold dear. The giant, Dali-esque elephant desperately trying to blend into the corner of our neat little room is the friendly neighbourhood landfill. And it’s not only the landfill – thrown into the deal are air pollution, water poisoning and spontaneous combustion. You never marry a single person, you marry the family. And this crowd is a hot mess.

We are getting increasingly concerned over climate change, or so the most recent research suggests. Needless to say, we are aligning our personal convictions and civic action accordingly…right? Not necessarily. In recent elections across the world, significant numbers cast their vote on policies that downplay or outright ignore the need to address climate change. What is going on here?

They called it “literally impossible” – an unachievable ambition for any human to outrun the 4-minute mile. If there was any hope in even attempting such a feat, conditions would have to be absolutely perfect: the track hard and dry, the temperature exactly 20 degrees Celsius; a windless day with tens of thousands of spectators to cheer you over the line. But it’s impossible, don’t forget, so why would you even try?

In 1997, McKinsey declared a War for Talent. Since then the world hasn’t let us forget it. In an economy where capital is abundant, competition is globally fierce, and iteration moves at the pace of lightning, they argue, “all that matters is talent. Talent wins.” As the job pool increasingly shallows in the digital economy, the battle for smart, technologically savvy, intuitive and operationally agile people with strong people leadership skills will only get bloodier. Add to this reality a widening skills gap in today’s workforce, and the effort to lock down the industry’s ‘best and brightest’ is even more intense. To survive disruption and thrive within the volatile and ever-changing world of business and workforce, McKinsey made it abundantly clear: to get what you want, you’ll have to engage in full frontal attack.

Big data is a big mystery these days. On one end, technology and its spectacular advancements has been touted as humanity’s royal flush for the 21st century – a trick hand to leapfrog our own extinction and win the future. On the other end, the idea of an ever-expanding, data-driven matrix could be kind of scary – okay, very scary – and may even resurrect a rather gloomy mood, with grey scale apocalyptic imagery on replay.

Chemotherapy – the invaluable treatment that has saved countless lives of cancer patients through blocking different functions in cell growth and replication – stemmed from the discovery, during World War II, that exposure to mustard gas in conflict significantly reduced soldiers’ white blood cell count, sometimes fatally. The compound nitrogen mustard was studied further by researchers and found to halt the growth of rapidly dividing cells such as cancer cells. This is just one example of humankind adapting a negative discovery into a positive one.

Leaders are leaders, not because they declare it, but because they live it. They never wear it as a badge, but bear it daily as a great responsibility.

In today’s fast-paced world full of shiny new technology, there seems to be little for the mundane. How do we make the ordinary extraordinary?

With digital disruptions and business models changing, uncertainty will need to become the new norm we learn to leverage.