Knowledge society part 2
In the near future, the knowledge society will demands its people to learn, be confident of their ability to learn, willing to learn new things, and ready to face the challenges of globalization. If people do not choose to become lifelong learners, they will be responsible for preventing their current society from transforming into a knowledge society.
Why do we need a knowledge society? Today technology changes more rapidly than our ability to deal with the change. Human beings have been on earth for about 7 million years, but 80 percent of the advances in technology have only occurred in the last 100 years. This rate is accelerating, not slowing down. More information was produced in the last 30 years than in the 5,000 years that preceded it. If we do not to accept these facts, we never understand why we would need to become a knowledge society. If the society is not learn new things and evolve, it will slowly moving backward to chaotic, violent and will be eliminated. Only the ability to learn can provide stability and the longer we resist, the farther behind we get, and the more difficult to catch-up.
The child who does not learn cannot grow. The child that cannot grow cannot mature and compete with other children. The society that does not learn cannot grow. The society that cannot grow cannot mature and compete with others. With globalization trend, every society must be competitive to survive. In the past, some societies choose not to compete by staying isolate but with the globalization trend, everything is changing. You can not stop the world from changing by not participate in it because everything is fully integrated and interdependency. As software engineer, we deal with change daily. We know software will change; we expect it to and we continue to adjust to what we have to do. Yesterday we had COBOL, FORTRAN and Pascal but today we have C, C++, C# and Java and I am sure tomorrow we will have something else. We must recognize that societies today are no different.
The software organizations that succeed in this highly competitive environment will be those that recognize that the only constant is change. Dealing with change demands that we rethink the way we educate workers who will manage and contribute to that change. Constant learning and relearning are critical to be competitive. The ability to learn faster than others is the discriminator. Dealing with change is what the knowledge society is all about and how fast we can change will determine whether we can compete in this global economy or not. Let me give you an example: Seventy five years ago, the U.S automobile industry was the best in the world, control 83% of the market. Automobile management think they own the market and become lazy then suddenly, the Japanese and S. Korean are stepping up and now dominate this industry when U.S automobile industry is bankrupt. The U.S software companies have dominated this industry in the past fifty years but things are changing now as more and more countries are stepping up to this challenge. The future will remains to be seen as India and China are capturing a large percentage of the market. Software is an easy market to enter because it does not require a lot of capital. Competing in the software industry is easier than the automobile industry because the only key ingredient is knowledge.
According to several university studies, the best jobs in the next twenty years will be “Knowledge jobs” and among computer-related jobs: Software engineer is the fastest growing career in the world. Network security rated No. 2, Information System Management rated No. 4, and Computer programmer rated No. 44. The U.S Department of Labor also said that the world will need about 3 to 4 million people to work in information technology field, more than five times number in the world today. These career fields are both fast growing and relatively lucrative. For these reasons, computer-related jobs globally will also be highly competitive.
Success in this Information Age will be defined not by what you know but by your ability to learn new things. Knowledge will quickly become obsolete, and the only survivors will be the lifelong learners. The critical skills we need are the abilities to learn. The best learners are becoming the most valuable people in the industry. Lifelong learning is becoming the single most important ingredient for success, and the responsibility for learning begins with the individual. As we are recognizing the responsibility of the individual to learn but individual learning cannot help the society as a whole. To be competitive the entire society must value the learning process and the responsibility to provide the training are the educators and the education institutions. The education institutions must provide training opportunities to the people and it is the responsibility of every people to learn.
As students, you must make the conscious decision to become a lifelong learner. Don't allow yourself to become lazy or the person who doesn't know how to learn. If you want to succeed in this global economy, you must find an education institution that can help you to acquire the needed knowledge and skills. Opportunities will go to people who have the capability to adapt and learn fast.
As an educator, your success depends upon your ability to inspire the best in your students, to expand their competence and capacity, and to create the right conditions so they can learn. You are the key in the making of a knowledge society. You must encourage your students to learn and development the skills that they will need to be successful and contribute to the society. You directly influence the ways in which vision, strategy, and learning goals are implemented. It is your responsibility to ensure that the training the students receive is adequate and appropriate.
As the leader of an education institution, you must recognize that the competitive edge of the 21st century will go to the society where continuous learning takes place. You must define the goals for your school and show personal commitment to them. You must allocate the resources to implement a system that supports your goals.
To create a knowledge society, to survive and thrive in this challenging time requires all of us working together since none can do it alone..
Sources
- Blogs of Prof. John Vu, Carnegie Mellon University
