Lately it
has happened, though, that I have put to test my analysis around this simple
but deep idea. And found I need to restructure my statement.
I still
strongly believe that the actual economic system – I will no longer call it
“capitalist” because I found out that it aroused too much controversy, which
distracted readers from what is the essence of my proposal – has been great in
creating wealth and allocating tangible resources, but that it has not been
good in allocating intangible resources which are as much – if not more –
valuable in terms of wealth creation than tangible resources. And amongst them
all, standing in the very front line, talent. The system does not incorporate
talent in its models. Perhaps mainly because we don´t know how to measure it:
how can you put a figure to the value creation of the talent of any given
person? First you must know which those talents are, then how can they be used
and only then you might have a first approach to what potential value creation
that person can contribute to during his or her life.
My key challenge
remains the same: what would the GDP of the world look like and how happier
would humanity be if all people could develop and put to work their inherent
talents where they liked best? Utopian as it may seem as a goal, it still is
valid as a new paradigm. And it is clear - self evident, we could say - that the GDP would be much higher, the world would be much more prosperous and a much better place to live. All people are endowed with talents when they come to the world. Talent must be the biggest resource available, yet the worst resource used.
And there
is where my past statement was confused. I tried to name the type of Society
around the main or the key resource. As Industrial Society was based on
industry (massification of production through industrial tools, adoption of
standards to lower costs, etc.) and Capitalism was based on the key role of
Capital and Capital allocation, so I took Peter Drucker’s – and many others –
term “Knowledge Society”, putting knowledge as “the” resource, following Peter
Drucker’s statement. But I have found out that knowledge, being “a” resource,
is not “the” resource. The key resource in Knowledge Society is not knowledge,
but talent. Knowledge is, to some extent, the “capital stock” of talent applied
to problems of any sort, codified and made explicit for others to use it. That
makes knowledge an input in the Knowledge Society, and as such, it is certainly
an important part, but it is not the one thing that will mean a leapfrog jump to
a radically better world. Creative destruction lies elsewhere.
Personal
talent discovered, developed and applied where it has more affinity with what
each person likes most doing, is what will drive the Knowledge Society and the
World Economy into a new paradigm of unimagined growth and prosperity. Talents
existing and not been properly developed, and/or allocated are still a huge
resource the system is misusing, making the economy a huge underperformer. Focusing
on how we can make this happen, utopian as it may seem, will mean moving in the
right direction.
I still have no way to measure how bigger the
GDP of the World would be if all people were to work where they are most
talented and where they like best to put them to work. My content is that we do
not need calculate that figure to realize it is “orders of magnitude”
higher than what we have today, meaning there is a path we may undertake,
worth taking.
When capitalism was first proposed, no one knew
what it would look like after two hundred years. If we showed today the most
enlightened economists from those years what it has accomplished, I think
they would say that it is not possible. That it is way above their best
estimates. So, why not take the chances in focusing on talent allocation? What
is there to lose but time, and what is there to gain but prosperity and a
better world?
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