A fascinating and fast paced five minute video has been making the rounds at a few conferences where I’ve been speaking recently. Entitled Shift Happens: Did You Know? the video uses a series of statistics and examples to show the accelerating pace of change creating our turbulent times.

Here are a few shift disturbing examples:

•    The top 10 in-demand jobs in 2010 didn’t exist in 2004.
•   “We are currently preparing students for jobs that don’t yet exist, using technologies that haven’t been invented, in order to solve problems we don’t even know are problems yet.”
•    The first commercial text message was sent in December 1992. Today the number of text messages sent and received every day exceeds the total population of the planet.
•    Years it took to reach a market audience of 50 million:
o    Radio: 38 years
o    TV: 13 years
o    Internet: 4 years
o    iPod: 3 years
o    Facebook: 2 years
•    The number of Internet devices in 1984 was 1,000, in 1999 it was 1,000, 000, and in 2008 it was 1,000,000,000.
•    There are now five times more words in the English language than during Shakespeare’s time.
•    It’s estimated that 4 exabytes of unique information will be generated this year. That’s more than the previous 5,000 years.
•    The amount of new technical information is doubling every two years. For students starting a four year degree this means that half of what they learn in their first year of study will be outdated by their third year of study.

CLICK HERE to view “Shift Happens: Did You Know?” and see more examples.

Shift Happens: Did You Know? dramatically illustrates the need for adapting ourselves, our teams, and our organizations to a world of constant and accelerating change. In writing Growing @ the Speed of Change I researched and developed a number of strategies for dealing with continuous change. These are three central findings and recommendations:

•    Accept that life is constant change. There’s no getting through or past this “crazy period” to some mythical place of stability, certainty, and a slower pace of change.
•    Change just is. It’s neither good nor bad. We make changes into good or bad for ourselves by how we choose to look at the situation.
•    When faced with tough changes we can lead, follow, or wallow. The higher we lead ourselves and others the better is our health, happiness, and productivity.

Here are a few postings on change you may want to check out (click on the titles) if you missed them the first time or revisit to recheck your change readiness:

•    Change Isn’t News (1:40 video at bottom of this page)
•    Constant Change: Leadership in a (Permanent) Crisis
•   Thoughts That Make You Go Hmmm…on Leading at the Speed of Change
•    Thoughts That Make You Go Hmmm…on Growing Through Change
•    Built to Change is Especially Critical Today