Comment créer du changement ? (texte en anglais)

HOW MIGHT THE PARADIGM SHIFTER, VISIONARY, AND PARADIGM PIONEER UTILIZE ENVIRONMENTAL SCANNING TO MORE EFFECTIVELY SHIFT A PARADIGM, VISION THE FUTURE, AND PIONEER A NEW IDEA, RESPECTIVELY?

INTRODUCTION

What is exactly and environmental scanning? It is the “Careful monitoring of an organization's internal and external environments for detecting early signs of opportunities and threats that may influence its current and future plans”. Through this definition, we can easily understand that this concept is tightly linked with the notion of new paradigms. In this way, how might the paradigm shifter, visionary, and paradigm pioneer utilize environmental scanning?

1. PARADIGM SHIFTERS AND ENVIRONMENTAL SCANNING

To start from the beginning, let’s have a brief overview of the precise definition of paradigm shifters. It is commonly known as a person who managed to change a paradigm. More precisely, this person is like an “outsider”. What does that means? It is just a person that doesn’t understand (partly or on the whole) the previous paradigm. This notion of outsider is really important in my mind because it settled the roots for my future demonstration. It could be, as Joel Arthur Barker says it in his book, either “A young person fresh out of training, an older person shifting fields, A Maverick, or a Tinkerer.”

The two first categories shared something strong. Indeed, they bring the necessary level of “naiveté” needed to shift the previous paradigm. In this way, they managed to create a change

because they are really outsiders; they don’t know many things about the existing paradigm and this lack of knowledge give them a strong competitive advantage. Consequently, when you belong in those categories of paradigm shifter, and according to me, it’s not necessary to have a real knowledge about the environment of your industry. Basics knowledge are of course mandatory , but if you know too much things upon the politics , economics , legal , social , and environmental factors upon which the whole existing paradigm rely on you might have difficulties to shift to the next paradigm. In this way, for the two first category of paradigm shifter, I would say that this environmental scanning is not a key point.

On the other hand, when regarding the two other categories, we have to acknowledge that environmental scanning is of a primordial importance. A Maverick could be defined as an insider who has a strong and precise knowledge of the existing paradigm, but he isn’t captured by it. He is mastering the paradigm with a deep efficiency which allows him to have a clear overview. A tinkerers is a person quit specialized who focuses on one of those special problems of the paradigm’s shelf. For those two categories of people, the knowledge of their environment isn’t mandatory, it’s essential! If they want to be part of the well known paradigm shifters they have to master efficiently their respective industry. The Bell telephone was revolutionized in the nineteenth by Almond B. This undertaker has a strong technological knowledge about his industry and he managed to revolutionize the most sophisticated technology of our days.

2. VISIONARY AND ENVIRONMENTAL SCANNING

A visionary is someone who has the capacity to foresight the future. Unfortunately this isn’t possible, at least with a perfect accuracy. I prefer this definition: a visionary

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