Activation: The Core Competency
by Edmund J. Freedberg
The greatest challenge facing us in today's highly competitive and continuously changing occupational world is not the acquiring of potential. It is the processing of that potential, minute by minute, hour by hour, day by day. In order to effectively respond to customer needs, the ever altering landscape, and the demand for greater personal responsibility, not only must we activate more and more of our potential, but we must activate it more flexibly – and more proactively – than we ever have before.
However, recognizing the necessity for a higher level and different kind of activation is, by itself, not enough to make it happen. An organization must actively create and sustain the opportunity that allows it to happen. But that too, is not enough. The individuals in the organization must have the skills that allow them to more effectively convert their potential into performance, whether that potential is newly acquired, of long standing, learned, or innate.
In Book One of "Activation: The Core Competency" entitled "Activating the Organization", Dr. Freedberg discusses some of the thinking and organizational behavior that often blocks corporations from giving more than lip service to the need for active, effective "ownership" on the part of their employees. A performance management model is discussed that supports an organization's moving from perceiving the need for more self-management to helping satisfy it. It gives individuals the responsibility for managing their own immediate performance, and frees managers to focus on people growth. It creates an environment in which higher, more effective levels of activation are both demanded and supported.
Book Two, "Activating the Individual", discusses easily understood and applied ways for a reader to continuously increase his/her level of Activation. By building and strengthening specific individual habits, the reader can increase not only the ability to convert more potential into performance, but the critical characteristics of flexibility, proactivity, and adaptability so important in today's world. By learning to better manage his/her potential, an individual increases the likelihood of success in both the occupational arena, and in his/her personal life.
