Recently a load of people have been talking to me about restructuring their teams for the future.
I’ve noticed that to do this they collect vast amounts of data in an effort to predict the future trends, business conditions, customer needs and so on.

The problem with the future
The problem is that the future is unpredictable. and the only people to generate a “five year plan was thr old Soviet Union…and look where they are today!

Take technology for instance…by the time it’s clear what will be affected in the future it’s too late! It move so fast that catching up is difficult far less being able to stay ahead. THerefore traditional planning where the object is to predict the future, develop detailed plans and restructure teams to take account of those predictions no longer make sense.

It must be assumed that the future can’t be predicted…but it can be prepared for. The answer is to shift how business prepares for the future.The task for business is to structure the organisation to be immediately flexible. That’s not new idea…but it’s rarely implemented successfully.

I’m excited about the future
Over the past months I’ve talked to so many business leaders about this topic. I’m excited that the result will be that I’m organising a series of events for selected business leaders to talk to them on how they can plan for the future they don’t yet know about.

Over this past month I’ve been researching how small business teams will work in the future.

This research has led me to attend a number of conferences where I’ve listened to highly successful “web-gurus” talk about how they are making $000s through on-line selling and affiliate marketing and using virtual teams.

There seems to be a number of common threads to all the talks:

• Small teams can provide exceptional products that are often better than equivalent and expensive products from larger businesses.
  This is true and I’ve even invested in two CD’s packed with useful information for under $10, including postage.

• Work such as marketing, web design, product production and delivery, customer contact and much more can be outsourced at a fraction of the current cost.
  Again very true and if there is one aspect to the future of business that will impact even large teams in multinational companies.
  

The final message that I heard from all of them is that individuals and small teams can make $000s without much effort. All you have to do is to buy the product package the “Guru” has developed for $000s and your journey to riches begins…100% money back if not satisfied…guaranteed!

I guess I shouldn’t be surprised that people still find the “instant riches” message so attractive. The Lottery, advertisers and TV game shows all contribute to this perception.

Having spoken to and observed some of the “Gurus” telling everyone how easy it is to make money on the web and that it only takes an hour a day it’s interesting that they themselves seem to work very very very hard and very long hours.

Perhaps the learning point is that: Technology makes life easier but the effort that needs to be directed towards producing and maintaining a successful and sustainable outcome for clients changes.
Those that get rich will only do so through hard work, the rest continue to delude themselves.