That feeling you have? It's Synchronicity

Synchronicity is a word I first saw years ago in a book of daily meditations. That it comes back to me relatively frequently – as a word, but also as a feeling and a conscious notion – seems to be evidence that I have bought into the concept. Simply put, I take it to refer to a profound sort of coincidence or serendipity. Or, a sophisticated way to acknowledge fate: things happen for a reason, there are dots to connect, and we are meant to see much of what happens as a call to heed the signals going off around us and make choices accordingly – not instead of having a sense of purpose, but as a means to staying on a chosen course.

Last month, as I headed to Washington, D.C., to celebrate the inauguration of Barack Obama — knowing already that the real and the symbolic signals of transformation would be everywhere — I was struck by synchronicity. Side-by-side on the editorial page of this newspaper, I read a conservative-leaning columnist’s analysis about how the current financial chaos has turned classical economics on its head (goodbye to the concept of rational incentives, he said, and hello to ‘‘context is everything’’ decision-making) and I reflected on a clever cartoon inspired by an Edith Wharton quote. “In spite of illness, in spite of the archenemy — sorrow — one can remain alive long past the usual date of disintegration if one is unafraid of change, insatiable in intellectual curiosity, interested in big things and happy in small ways.”

What a potent mixture to feed an entrepreneur! In my mind, I paraphrased: the old ways of organizing and financing business are not working; the societal context around our work is transforming, and so perhaps is the value of the work itself. Further, the best way to avoid ‘‘disintegration’’ is to be unafraid, to let our curiosity run, to think big and yet take pleasure in small things. And if I needed more evidence of synchronicity: the mood, the scenes, the news angles of the Obama inaugural week provided it.

So what’s the synchronicity in my own work? Well, I’m managing a nimble, well-established professional services firm, employing a very talented group of people; we have the trust and confidence of a great list of clients; the marketplace for customers is increasingly global and dynamic; yet, the pressures on our clients (and so on us) are as onerous as I can recall in 30 years — access to capital; balancing stakeholder obligations; increasingly fractured competitiveness. And so the pressure mounts to find new, compelling ways to create value, to be successful in the marketplace of the future.

The signals are clear: take Edith Wharton’s advice! Be unafraid to really change; to think big about how to create value; and be happy if the payoff comes over time and in perhaps ‘‘small ways.’’
Stating it frankly: the realization must be coming to each of us that not only do we need to pitch in to solve the challenges facing our communities, our nation and the planet; we need to change the way we think about success, and reset our calculus for risk/reward.

For some in our midst, it likely feels like “back to the future;” returning to by-gone notions of personal and corporate citizenship and values. But for many others, this will truly be a New World Order.

A current prediction that it may take the United States a dozen years to fully replace the market value lost over the past year is a mind-blowing notion to contemplate in a culture that has come to demand instant consumer gratification — and where corporate incentives can pay out based on 12 months (or less) of barely-decent performance. How do we create motivation to innovate, to risk, to really change, in an environment that may take 12 years to get back to scratch?
I don’t have all the answers, but I’ll argue that the recipe will certainly need to include:

• leadership that sets good examples of longer term thinking

• fierce enforcement of fairness: rules really do need to apply to everyone. (Obama’s restrictions on executive pay for banking companies taking federal bailout money comes to mind, as does the fate of Tom Daschle’s nomination.)

• celebrating the ‘small stuff,’ and the journey along the way

Our new president has convincingly made the case for change – and his case was affirmed by the size of his electoral victory. Now we each need to take ownership of what it means for us.
Synchronicity might help you. My only other advice is to get to work, and maybe read some Edith Wharton.

Published, StarTribune, 2/16/09