Linchpin

Our world is filled with factories. Factories that make widgets, insurance, websites, movies, take care of sick people and answer the phone. You can become a great factory worker if you pay attention in school, follow instructions, show up on time and try hard and in return they would take care of you. You won't have to be brilliant, creative or to take big risks. The factories would pay you a lot of money, give you health insurance and offer you job security. It's a pretty seductive bargain, so seductive for that century, we embraced it. We set up our school and our systems and our government to support that bargain.

For a long time it worked, but in the face of competition and technology, the bargain has fallen apart: job growth is flat at best, wages in many industries are on a negative cycle, the middle class is under siege like never before, and the future appears dismal. People are no longer being taken care of: pensions are gone, 401ks have been sliced in half and it’s hard to see where to go from here.

Suddenly, in the scheme of things, it seems like the obedient worker bought into a suckers deal. You weren't born to be a cog in the giant industrial machine, you were trained to become a cog. The bargain is gone and it's not worth whining about and it's not effective to complain. There's a new bargain now, one that leverages talent and creativity and art more than it rewards obedience

A linchpin is an unassuming piece of hardware, something you can buy for 69 cents at the local hardware store. It's not glamorous, but it's essential. It holds the wheel onto the wagon, the thingamajig onto the widget. Every successful organization has at least one linchpin, some have dozens or even thousands. The linchpin is the essential element, the personal who holds part of the operation together. Without the linchpin, things fall apart.

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