In today’s world things don’t last long.

Not even championship games.

Being a huge Steelers fan I loved their SuperBowl run this year.  I watched dozens of hours worth of pre-game shows.  I read any article that mentioned the Steelers.  Frankly I loved every minute of it.  Even the game was intense.  Some have said the Steelers victory over the Cardinals was an all time classic.  Don Banks of Sports Illustrated even described it as “the best Super Bowl in history“.

Despite the accolades and endless pre-game material, the broadcast was over moments after the game ended.

All this fanfare.  And then it was gone.  This year’s Stanley Cup Finals were even worse.  The series ended on Friday and by Monday I found very few news stories discussing the Penguins victory over the Red Wings.

That’s how it is though.  Today’s big thing is tomorrow’s old news.

Now this isn’t all bad.  It actually encourages risk taking.  It encourages you to be revolutionary.  If you screw up today, by tomorrow no one remembers.  There is freedom in that.  Can you imagine if you made one mistake and it was held against you for the rest of your career?  Perhaps some of you work in environments like that.  If I asked you to describe the culture of your organization, my guess is I would hear words like “rigid”, “hierarchical”, and “top-down.”

Rapid change has a way of destroying rigid structures and of toppling hierarchies.

Of course there is one big draw back to living with rapid change.  Your success doesn’t last.  There is always someone innovating.  Always someone moving forward.  Someone growing.  If you stand still too long, you’ll simply be passed by.

Whether we want to admit it or not, we live in a world of rapid change.  And that means we are faced with a choice.  Do we use that change to our advantage?  Or do we become tomorrow’s old news?

image courtesy of flickr