Public Health Intersection

Earlier this week, I had the opportunity to hear Simon T Bailey speak at the California Society Of Association Executives.
Simon is a very compelling speaker and part of his talk revolves around the concept of what he calls Vuja De which is intended to be the opposite of déjà vu.
He uses the common understanding of déjà vu, i.e. something we have seen before or feel that we have seen before and suggests that we need to strive for vuja de or something we have never seen before.
Having had the opportunity to take four years of high school French as well as being a French interpreter at the Boy Scout World Jamboree in 1967, I know that the opposite of déjà vu in French is more correctly jamais auparavant or never previously.

Simon's concept though is a great one.
Simply put, strive to develop and implement something you have never seen before.
Too often, in government budgeting, government programming, business and life in general we continue to stay in places that are familiar but not necessarily productive.
To paraphrase the late William Sloane Coffin, it’s a leap of faith because you can't see where you're going to land.

If we are paying attention, the current turmoil around us should indicate that the way we have always done things isn't working very well.

Often, when things are the most challenging, is the time when innovation and change makes the most sense.

Not just cutting or shrinking what we have historically done but entirely redesigning it.

One of the biggest challenges is making sure we maintain our core values in the midst of an otherwise, "everything's on the table", massive change.

I'm not talking about change for change sake; I'm talking about change to make things better than they were before.

Hopefully, in these difficult times we can focus on more than just hanging onto what we used to have but instead focus on how we can be innovative and make things better than they were.