The surge in American optimism that accompanied President Obama's inauguration on Tuesday is undeniable. The social change being designed in Washington is bound to affect organizations -- and not just in business.
Here are some excerpts from President Obama's January 24 weekly address*:
- "That is why I have proposed an American Recovery and Reinvestment Plan to immediately jumpstart job creation as well as long-term economic growth. ... I hope to sign it into law in less than a month."
- "we’ll renovate and modernize 10,000 schools, building state-of-the-art classrooms, libraries, and labs."
- "We’ll ... triple the number of fellowships in science to help spur the next generation of innovation."
Consider the opportunities for educational organizations if this plan becomes law. Renovating schools is not just an economic boost for the construction industry -- it's also something that will affect schoolteachers and the ways that they involve students in learning. Colleges and universities will face increased demand to educate new science teachers, and to offer meaningful continuing education for those already in the classroom.
Other aspects of the plan identify similar opportunities for other industries, such as healthcare, information technology, and communications. Managers responding to these initiatives will not only be able to offer new jobs to others -- but also to redesign those jobs, and how those people work together to achieve key goals.
I have been surprised to review the search results that lead to my blog, the Wisdom of Managing Change, and see how many involve "layoffs" or "downsizing" as search terms. There is certainly a lot of anxiety in the blogosphere about layoffs. I hope that managers making decisions about changing their organizations will consider the need to pursue opportunities like those identified in this post. As I have written before, layoffs are often short-term measures that can have unintended consequences.
* Oh, and how cool is it that the weekly presidential address has entered the 21st century? These used to be radio-only addresses, I believe. Obama now has streaming web video, plus a transcript, on the White House website.
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