How to grasp the value of intelligence today

As a professional educator/trainer/mentor, I have long held the position that 

"If you think education and training are expensive, consider the cost of ignorance"

Unfortunately, not enough people hold this principle to be true.  And today, you'll see plenty of HR/Training people in the unemployment centers, collecting benefits.

Perhaps if we understood the foundations of our society, this would make more sense.  So here goes:

Back in the beginning (a period I'll call BC or "before computers") up to about 1850, people lived in what was an agrarian society, one that was based on agriculture as its prime means for support and sustenance. This form of society acknowledges other means of livelihood and work habits but stresses on agriculture and farming, and was at the time the main form of socio-economic organization for most of recorded human history.    

• the view of people was on the past
• the strategic resource at the time was Land, and 
• the "transforming resource" to create value was physical labor  

But the Industrial Revolution heralded a new era, beginning in the late 18th and early 19th centuries when major changes in agriculture, manufacturing, mining, and transportation had a profound effect on the socioeconomic and cultural conditions in Britain, then spreading throughout Europe, North America, and eventually the world. The onset of the Industrial Revolution marked a major turning point in human society; almost every aspect of daily life was eventually influenced in some way.   

• the view of people was on the present
• the strategic resource at the time was Capital, and 
• the "transforming resource" to create value was processed energy 

Beginning in the 1960's accompanying advances in computer and communications technology we saw the dawn of a new era, the Information Age.  This era is characterized by the ability of individuals to.. transfer information freely, and to have instant access to knowledge that would have been difficult or impossible to find previously.  

• the view of people is on the future
• the strategic resource at the time was Information, and 
• the "transforming resource" to create value was intelligence 

As with previous new era's come the difficulty transforming old skills into contemporary ones.  Today, as we seek new ways to effectively manage information and create intelligence, there is need for a struc ture to help us do so.

Enter "The Skills Framework for the Information Age" (SFIA, pronounced like the name Sophia), a evolving model for describing and managing competencies for information professionals for the 21st century.  

Its purpose is to help match the skills of the workforce to the needs of organizations. It maps out the range of skills as a two-dimensional table, tagging each skill with a category and responsibility level.

For example, categories are divided into six main areas: Strategy and planning; Business change; Development; Service provision; Procurement and management support; and Ancillary skills. Each of these is then further divided into sub-categories, mapping out 78 separately identifiable skills. Each of these skills has a general description.

Thus, the path to intelligence, by optimizing information "systems" will necessitate identifying new skills, and developing people to master these skills, for us to continue to grow and develop as an information economy.

But, there is another element that we must bear in mind.  The people who will enable the future of this promising era.  It is whose who have grown up in it and can fully appreciate how information can be used to its greatest strategic value.

Here's where there is a bit of generational "friction".  The traditionalists, who were born (1900-1945) and for the most part are now retired, had the attitide “I learned it the hard way; you can too!” which valued hard work at the individual level over working smarter.  Training was something that you learned "on thge job".  

The Baby Boomers management looked at training differently, “Train ‘em too much and they’ll leave”.  Guess what?  If you don't train em, they'll leave...

Generation Xers leaders generally "get it" with their “The more they learn, the more they stay” point of view, but the generation that really understands the value of learning are the Milennials who see 

“Continuous learning as a way of life”

I personally feel that the Millenials are the generation that truly appreciate the value of information and will be tomorrows leaders that will lead us, through advancing use of technology in education, empowering us us to realize the "intelligence" we are capable of