Next week is my birthday. And as the day approaches I recall that an advisor recently told me that my life is likely half over. Since I’ll be 51, I am OK with that prospect.

There remains a lot to look forward to in the future. I’m still planning new business ventures, meeting new friends, planning and creating memories with my family and most of all continuing to learn. For me the learning is not just focused on acquiring professional knowledge. That never ends. There is always some new approach or concept about people and how we behave to read about, or some new situation or challenge in the workplace that catches my attention. However, some of the most universal learning for me comes from developing my skills in sailing and music, two pursuits that bring me a lot of joy and pleasure, along with pain sometimes.

As I am still rehabbing my “sailing elbow”, I’ll offer more thoughts about the impact of sailing in a future post. Focusing on music, I have always been a big fan of rock drums and have followed various drummers throughout their careers since my early teens. John Bonham and Steve Gadd were a couple of my icons, Regrettably, although I saw Gadd a few times, I never got to see Zeppelin play live. At rock concerts, I was one of those few in the crowd to jump up and applaud after a killer drum solo.

I learned a lesson when I was persuaded by a friend to take up playing the drums 2 ½ years ago. We were at a break at a Steely Dan concert talking about music and I was lamenting that I had never learned to play drums, even though I have been a huge fan of the instrument. His message was simple, “why not start now?” So I did. He plays bass guitar and as it turns out, he started playing bass around the middle of his life as well. A few drum lessons were followed by practice sessions in my garage, where we have since added some other players and now can proudly call ourselves a garage band.

Here’s the kicker, so to speak. The real lesson was that learning something new and fun remains a humbling experience. My ego is continually challenged when I can’t play a beat or a drum fill in the way I hear it on the recording. I had to accept the fact that I was incompetent and that I would fail a lot – until I didn’t. For a while it would have been easier to stop. I am improving (so my band mates tell me). Still, learning is not easy, despite the rewards. Professionally I am continually working to persuade people to learn new skills and develop new habits, and my journey to learn to play drums is a useful reminder of how demanding learning can be, especially for adults.

My bass player friend that inspired me to learn got me tapped into the joy and benefits I could receive by investing the practice time and applying real effort. Most importantly he was patient and realized that I had to start when I was ready and at my level of ability. Despite the perceived benefits, an attractive goal or objective can best be reached when we are willing to accept that fact that quick successes are not always realistic when the desired change is significant. As each of us marches (or plays) to our own drummer, if we can be patient and keep our ego from getting in our way, we have a much better chance of leveraging the learning.

“Change
it had to come
We knew it all along
We were liberated from the fall that’s all
But the world looks just the same
And history ain’t changed…”

-Pete Townshend

And so it goes… or does it?

History is changing, right under our noses. Maybe it was a fitting coincidence that the dot-com revolution peaked in January 2000. A nice clean start to the 21^st century. Yes, this is the 21^st century. Almost ten years into it, doesn’t that still have a far away, tomorrow-like ring to it? Thanks to the hyper-changes brought about by the speed and reach of the web, what worked yesterday isn’t working today, and likely won’t work tomorrow. There are enough lessons around us to make that point (see GM). We got the call. Some of us got the early wake-up call. For the rest of us, the alarm has definitely gone off and it would be a mistake to hit the snooze button this time.

Leaders, in any field, at any level, would do well to consider the benefits of organizing around a different set of precepts to fulfill their purpose and continue to thrive and deliver products or services. Now is the time to really do something about getting people out of their mental and organizational silos and not just sit around in meetings talking about it. If you continue to be a slave to artificial constructs like your existing org chart, don’t be surprised if you find yourself and your organization behind the curve once again, continuing to play defense when threatened by increased competition or diminishing revenue. We keep hearing that an improved economy won’t mean we can go back to business as usual. Instead of staying in your bunker, hoping the smoke will clear, you have an opportunity to plan now so that you can charge forward later.

We hear the call to “Take risks. Innovate. Change.” Sounds smart doesn’t it? Have you really figured out what this means? Are you stuck trying to figure out what the boss really wants? Don’t wait because the fundamentals are more important now than ever. As a 21^st century leader you might start by doing these simple things:

1. Focus on what your core business is. What are you good at? Is there still a need for what you offer or how you offer it?
2. Evaluate your talent. Who is good at doing what? How motivated are they to help come up with new ideas and solutions? Who isn’t adding value?
3. Spend time determining how best to get your talent focused and aligned. What should they be doing? How should they be doing it? What support do they need?
4. Take a look at the reporting structure. Does it still make sense? Look at the individual units or even departments. What would happen if you blew up the boxes and started over?

This should be Management 101, right? Then how come you, your boss and your organization aren’t really doing it? Granted, it isn’t easy, but it doesn’t have to be too complex if you plan, take one step at a time and make the effort a priority. This is leading. Do you still want to wait for permission?

“To Change something, build a new model…”

- R. Buckminister Fuller.