Sep 16 2008

Just What is ChangeForge?

Published by Ken Stewart at 11:45 pm under State of the Blog

This is a question I hear a lot, along with a quizzical cocking of the head to one side (much like a puppy might). It is an odd pairing of words to slap together, might be what they are thinking. But what most ask is, “f-o-r-G-e? fohrj - right?”, as if spelling it might suddenly shed a brilliant light upon the meaning of the name I chose.

ChangeForgeFolks, it’s an odd name. Say it with me; get it off your chest. Conventional wasn’t what I was driving at…

Max is rather fond of poking at me like I just sat around with a scrabble board mixing and matching words until I found a .com name that was available. That always makes me laugh. But I digress…

As I sift through the voluminous amounts of reading and the endless meandering thoughts I entertain, it was important for me to tell you what ChangeForge is to me - not on some About page, but a little back story on what ChangeForge means to me. While some might debate whether my branding is on-target or off-target, many of you may not have even visited my site, as a large percentage of my readership visits me through e-mail, FeedBurner, and FriendFeed.

A Little Backstory

When I was in the United States Marine Corps, I had a sergeant that taught me a lot about the way things worked. He showed me tips and tricks to succeeding not just in the Corps, but really illuminated some of the finer points about what outlook I should have if I wanted to go farther than just being a “tech”.

One of the things that stuck with me most was what he believed about leaders. He believed leaders would always need advisors to help them understand technology, and there are a choice few who can act as a bridge for them - a choice few who understood what these leaders wanted and could give it to them.

Don’t stand in their way, enable them to succeed and you will be their closest advisors.

Lesson 1: Be a bridge not a gatekeeper.

After leaving the Marine Corps, I worked for a division of a global corporation that relished the “status quo”. When I would ask, “Why?”, I would receive blank stares and comments regarding how it had always been done that way - and not to rock the boat. As you can imagine, I hit that glass ceiling very quickly. I learned that if you don’t change - if you aren’t innovating - you die.

Lesson 2: Change keeps you alive. Embrace it.

Working in my present position and company, as both a technologist and leader, has offered many challenges and rewards. After working in the field of technology for over a decade and with this company for half of those years, I have learned a singularly valuable lesson. I chose my tagline, where business and technology collide, from this lesson:

Lesson 3: Business and technology do not naturally fit… they collide in a graceless dance to which you must give rhythm and harmony.

Change is forged in the fire of business; Technology is my anvil, and I must be the hammer.

So you see, ChangeForge is the culmination of 3 very important life lessons I have learned. As I am a student of life, and of that change that comes as part of life, I relish the thought of sharing ideas with you, my valued readers.

Today is always exciting and the promise of tomorrow looms large in our mind’s eye… To be a student of change can be difficult, but a role those who cherish life choose to embrace. Again, welcome to ChangeForge.com.

Ken Stewart’s blog, ChangeForge.com, focuses on the collision between the constantly changing worlds of business and technology. Ken is also the Director of Technology at Kearns Business Solutions.

  • ChangeForge… featured on The Photizo Group’s Managed Print Services website
  • Is Your Culture a Culture of Team?
  • Top 10 Blog Posts: ChangeForge Favorites

    • Tags: ,

    Viewing 8 Comments

      • ^
      • v
      Kia ora Ken!

      "Change is forged in the fire of business; Technology is my anvil, and I must be the hammer."

      The fire and the anvil! That's very poetic.

      I have a copy of a book by J K Baxter, celebrated New Zealand poet. The book belonged to my wife's father who was a lecturer in English lit. I never met him, but I cherish his books, all of which I've read.

      This particular book is entitled, "The Fire and The Anvil". It is about people, poets and poetry - the dynamics that exists between the readers and critics (the Anvil) of literature and its writers. Baxter drew those analogies from a vision of the Fire being where the creativity is generated (within the writer) and the Anvil where the script, fresh from the forge, is hammered into shape (through change). This occurs by the action of the critics on the minds of the writers as they hammer their wares into forms that are accepted ultimately by the critics. The cold result is what has been accumulated over the years as poetry.

      Acceptibility seems to be a theme in the book, though I've never found the metaphor for it, if Baxter had one, that is. The literature of the writers is what really changes through this forging process.

      But in your post, you speak of change as if it is a thing that is forged. I read is as 'change is forged'. But it is the forging that causes change in the first place, and it has to be done on something that undergoes change. It cannot just be change, as this would amount to change for the sake of change. There must be something I've missed. Something that has to be forged to fit certain criteria.

      Could you please explain?

      Ka kite
      • ^
      • v
      Surely, Ken... Very profound observation (and I would expect nothing less).

      I suppose what I'm driving at here is that I do see change happening organically everywhere - but always at the expenditure of energy. Change is part of nature, but not natural behavior to human beings (outside of biologically) - from my experience; it takes energy to learn new things but we continue to do so because we can survive by learning new skills...

      In this specific reference, 'change is forged' - I would be mostly referencing change as the observation and/or measurement of the effect after the metamorphosis - but eluding to it being almost tangible.

      In effect, I truly believe - and have witnessed - that people in business will stagnate unless forced to change (e.g. external market pressures, client need, exploration of more revenue, etc.) - and I should say 'forced to innovate' more pointedly.

      Even moreso, it is interesting to me that I tend to see that change management indeed requires lots of energy. So it is this perception of things that I tend to write towards.

      Does this answer your question? What are your thoughts?
      • ^
      • v
      Kia ora Ken!

      Change can take place in a number of ways. You said that you see it everywhere, “but always at the expenditure of energy”. I think it depends on what you mean by “expenditure of energy”.

      I don’t know how much you know of thermodynamics, but in that discipline, change always involves energy. It’s a rule of thumb, but not entirely exclusive, that when energy is put into part of a system it becomes more disordered. When energy moves out of part of a system it becomes more ordered.

      Within any two differing parts of a system, there is usually a differential that causes energy to flow naturally. The flow drops to near zero when most of the energy is dissipated. In that state, the system is incapable of doing any more ‘work’. That is to say no more energy can be drawn from it. The system has stagnated if you like.

      To put it back to how it was requires energy, which funny enough, has to come from other parts of the same system.

      The strange thing about all this is that useful energy is the energy that has the potential to flow from high to low energy. Simply the presence of high energy within a system can be quite useless when trying to get it to do something. This is the thermodynamic paradox if you like, because a differential between high and low energies is always needed for the change to be possible (so that it is useful).

      It’s these other parts of the system that can benefit from differentials when useful energy is needed. To establish differentials where there was none draws energy form elsewhere in the system. In other words, you have to put energy in.

      I suspect that it’s this energy that you are referring to when you say “always at the expenditure of energy”.

      Ka kite
      • ^
      • v
      Very interesting when apply the principle of thermodynamic to business. My reference of "always at the expenditure of energy" would more reference the energy expended to create the differentials. It would be useful energy one might hope to harness and apply it in order to create forward momentum to propel the 'changes' forward within the business.
      • ^
      • v
      Kia ora Ken!

      As with business, in thermodynamics there are many instances where the energy used to establish the differenctials is less than the energy obtained from them. It all depends on where you are in the system. A good example of thermodynamics showing this is in the use of so-called heat pumps to heat a home.

      Pumping heat from one part of the system (outside) to another (inside) in some circumstances actually takes less energy than the required direct energy input. That is to say, an electric bar heater uses MORE energy than the energy required to pump the same quantity of heat from one spot to another. That's thermodynamics.

      Now if you think that this is far removed from business, that would be quite falacious.

      I am not a practicing network marketer - never have been - but I've studied the 'dynamics' of it. Tell you what, the efficiency of network marketing (no matter what one's point of view about it as a business) is sweet.

      That's because it works like an efficient thermodynamic system, where the maximum gain (profit) is obtained throughout a series of differentials. The more diverse the market spread, the greater the gain (profit) by the exponent of that spread. When there is simply one direct input (differential) the least profit is obtained for the same amount of product shifted. That's business.

      Ka kite
      from Middle-earth
      • ^
      • v
      Ken, quite the contrary... I completely agree with all observations and find your commentary infinitely fascinating. Keep it coming!
      • ^
      • v
      What more is there to say, Ken?

      Thermodynamics is a broad discipline. It has been explored from many different points of view, from the particulate to the energy entities. It is quite definitely a 20th century Science.

      But is was born out of necessity, through developments in business technology such as in the internal combustion engine and the jet engine. It is has been applied to heating systems, air-conditioning systems, atmospheric phenomena, including meteorological uses - it is legion.

      There is no doubt in my mind that its principles have wide application, perhaps to things yet unexplored.

      Ka kite
      • ^
      • v
      Well written. Now just loose the typewriter font on the top banner and I will really be impressed.
     

    Trackbacks

    (Trackback URL)

    close Reblog this comment
    Powered by Disqus · Learn more
    blog comments powered by Disqus