writing this article , Apple is a $ 2 Trillion company !
Why do very smart people miss out on great opportunities ? The greatest threat to success is success . People who have had some level of success will find it difficult to move into a dimension that requires a different way of thinking from the one that made them successful . Their success creates a blind spot .
We live in an era where the greatest billion dollar breakthroughs are coming from people in their twenties and thirties . Now , these young people are going to come up with ideas that do not fit into your ancient box . You will need humility not to impose your box on them which unfortunately is what many successful older people do . They view each opportunity through the lens of what made them successful . A book I recommend for many is the classic by Marshall Goldsmith , What Got You Here Won ' t Get You There .
Co-Founder of Black Entertainment Television Sheila Johnson says that she divided her life into acts like in a play . She said in act one , she was a concert violinist , act two she was running BET and in act three she is running a chain of hotels and resorts . You need a different way of thinking for each act . You need to view each act through different glasses . When however you insist on imposing your past on the present , you will lose the future .
African startups are raking in billions of dollars from foreign capital today and if care is not taken , we might just lose the future for the simple reason that we have people who want the future to be an exact replica of the past . It is not going to happen and people who do not realize this will be given opportunities on platters of gold but with their own hands block themselves from the opportunities .
Leaders who have been able to capture new waves have been humble . Why is humility important ? Because with humility comes teachability . Now being humble in this context is totally different from not being proud . Not being proud is that you do not flaunt your success , you do not look down on others and you do not use your position and success to intimidate others . You can be all this and still not be teachable .
Being teachable is accepting that what you know is not all there is to know . It is knowing that the fact that you are right does not mean that the other person is wrong . It is knowing that you had a season of glory and when a new season comes , you need to be ready to follow the lead of others and not insist on doing it your way . In doing so , you will extend your season of glory as you ride on the success of innovation that you know absolutely nothing about .
So , the digital revolution is here and many of the old school leaders calling the shots today are clueless about what to do or what the future holds . However if they can be teachable and if they can humble themselves to unlearn in order to relearn , there will indeed be hope for them , the industries they lead and Africa as a whole . Never underestimate the power of a company colonizing a nation . Lots of precedent abounds to this effect .
Dr . Wale Akinyemi is the Chief Transformation Officer , PowerTalks Corporate & Personal Development Consultants . He is a seasoned coach , mentor and writer . You can commune with him on this or related matters via email at : Wale @ powertalks . biz .