Literally!
Out of all the things buzzing in my head for a “new decade” post, the idea I want to highlight most is the increasing importance of making stuff.
It’s been germinating in my mind via MakerCulture in the Making by UWO + Ryerson’s online journalism classes. Last week it was crystalized by Umair Haque’s “Builders’ Manifesto” for HBR:
Today’s builders are igniting the distant grandchild of yesterday’s industrial revolution: an institutional revolution for a post-industrial world. They are forging the new building blocks — from ethical investment, to deep journalism, to socially useful finance, to universally accessible communication — that a rusting economy, society, and polity so urgently demand.
The 21st century doesn’t need more leaders – nor more leadership. Only Builders can kickstart the chain reaction of a better, more authentic kind of prosperity.
Our culture has already become very goal-driven in a pernicious way: the numbers and titles are often treated as more valuable than real value. Look at Enron, look at AIG. Look at the gamesmanship in politics. Look at what people are not learning at school…
But this week I’ve noticed a change in the way people are assessing their past-year performance and setting their New Year goals.
It isn’t just about hitting targets within institutional frameworks, I’m seeing more of us talking about learning and stretching beyond given boundaries… making stuff with the resources at hand — things we can actually own and control — creating bits of value that might be small, but at least we can keep…
It’s another example of the web as our way to understanding. I’m watching people use it as a platform for tinkering and trying things, learning and taking on new challenges, putting their work out in the open for feedback and discoverability, collaborating on projects and sharing knowledge, and growing in the process.
This isn’t new (remember this is one of my earliest public predictions) but the fact it is becoming more deliberate and openly accountable is noteworthy. There seem to be new conventions emerging (i.e. replacing resumés with reputation and digital breadcrumbs).
Eventually organizations will learn to incorporate makership, or constructivism, or whatever you want to call it. Entrepreneurship will eventually be brought within institutional bounds… eventually. For now, they still have a lot of learning to do.
Locally I noticed Scott Webb contrast his creative and entrepreneurial endeavours with the institutional apathy he sees at his “day job”:
within my corporate cubicle life, my job usually requires us to do an annual review and most people don’t care about it. It’s a time they despise and try to avoid.
Compare that attitude with what we see around the blogosphere, especially in everyone’s annual reviews.
Look at Pat Dryburgh’s post written in the wee hours of Christmas morning, outlining how he’s going to work on making his approach to design more purposeful and strategic in the new year.
One of Kevin Van Lierop’s year-end posts is what made all this click for me:
This past year has been a productive one for me in terms of photography. Not only did I purchase my first DSLR, but I started a community group, have had a number of images published and have even made a little bit on money on the side because of my photos.
The number of people whom I have met because of photography has increased within the last few months and I am glad to have met each and everyone of them.
All in all this past year has been, what I will call, an overwhelming success.
The success we make for ourselves is so much more generative and sustainable than the kind that’s merely won and awarded “in recognition.”
And surprise surprise, research shows that making progress is the number one motivator at work. According to an article in the current Harvard Business Review, this part by Teresa M. Amabile and Steven J. Kramer:
On days when workers have the sense they’re making headway in their jobs, or when they receive support that helps them overcome obstacles, their emotions are most positive and their drive to succeed is at its peak.
Ironically, I’m deeply skeptical about our macro-economic prospects for the next couple of years, yet I’m writing a very positive post.
I’m optimistic because I know that despite the worst that could happen, as long as we’ve adopted the spirit of makership and mastered autonomous creativity, we have the will and means to adapt and endure anything.
So bring it on…
