RE-CEP-TA-CLE

Producere
by James Shelley, October 18, 2011

Perhaps the most succinct way to appropriate all this “New Economy” talk is to simply say this: You can’t sit around and wait for someone to build you a factory to work at anymore.1 The days of going out to “get a job” are fading away, while the time to “make a job” stretches out ahead. And I do not mean start a “make work” project to aimlessly twiddle time away, I literally mean “make a job.” If you want a job, build it. As Thomas Friedman said, “Think like an immigrant“2 — don’t assume anything is owed to you.

So, economics 101: you must create or deliver something of value for another person. Unfortunately we have all but neutered the root words for this creative act: production, productivity, produce — they all derive from the Latin producere which meant to bring forth (pro) and to lead (ducere; the same root word from which we inherited the word duke to describe a commander or leader). All the self-help productivity and leadership materials out there are essentially addressing the same issue: our central human need to produce.

Downturn, recession, depression — we are using the wrong words: We do not need an economic revolution, we need a leadership revolution. We need people who will set forth and launch out to experiment, invent, and create things of value. This is production. This is productivity. Our fixation on “the economy” might be our greatest liability inasmuch as it distracts from the actual work of creating.