Constant change is not normal, but it is necessary

We’ve heard the phrase ‘change is the new normal’ so much now that it no longer has any meaning.

Normal is nothing more than what everyone is doing… until someone stops

We often talk about change and how used we have become to it.

But have we? Have we really become accustomed to constant change?

I think not.

I would argue we have become fairly accustomed to new things appearing. If that is what you mean by change then, yes, we are doing fine. We, as a society and as an industry, are demonstrating every sign of speedier adoption.

We learn faster. We accept faster. When it comes to technology that is. New ideas are a bit trickier. But I digress.

I concede that we have got better at dealing with new stuff.

But that isn’t the same as change, or at least it isn’t all of change.

‘Normal’, according to the Oxford English Dictionary (or, as I like to call it, ‘the other place’ dictionary), is defined as ‘conforming to a standard; usual, typical or expected’.

So, things that obey natural laws… are normal.

But so are things that are ubiquitous.

If everyone does it, it’s normal.

I know that most people in everyday parlance use normal to denote some superior, inevitable morality or, indeed, naturalness, but sadly for your judgy neighbour and the right-wing rhetoric on TV, normal is just about the statistical mean.

It is what everyone is doing.

Remember when you’d get home from school and present your mum with a poor grade or a bust knee or some mishap that you desperately tried to justify in terms of ‘everyone else was also doing it’? Everyone else also flunked the test. Everyone else was also climbing that tree. Everyone else also got detention for that water fight in front of the school (they did as well).

Whatever it was.

And your mum always said, “And if everyone else jumped off a cliff, would you follow?”

No?

Just my mum?

OK then…

But the point remains.

Normal is pervasive. And compelling. And easily taken for granted and imbued with inevitability.

Why am I telling you this?

Because change is the opposite of normal, and it has not become our new normal. Because change is always new and as such is still confusing and jarring. And that’s OK. We don’t need it to become normal. We just need it to keep happening.

So it’s OK if it is the opposite of normal.

As long as we remember that it is still necessary. And that confusion and discomfort is part of it.

I remember the first time I met Wise (then TransferWise), Revolut, Azimo… and they presented me with a vision of cheaper remittances. My first reaction was, “Wait… can you actually do that?” And the answer was, “Why yes, you can.” It was not normal at the time in that nobody else was doing it… but there was no inevitability to that normality and fast forward a decade later… ‘normal’ is spot FX and competitive remittance costs.

Why am I telling you this?

Because inside our context, there is a lot of stuff we take for granted because it’s… well… normal. Because everyone is doing it. You notice it in human behaviour… how much stuff passes for normal in any given context. You notice it a lot when you operate between different countries, cultures or socio-economic contexts.

Ask any mixed-nationality couple or any working-class kid in a banking job.

You notice it in the service industry if you work with various providers of the same thing at the same time.

But you don’t notice it if you don’t operate outside your context. You don’t notice it unless you context-switch. Because in context, normal is pervasive. That’s the point.

So, imagine how I felt during a bit of vigorous context-switching… during which I found out that in some markets it is normal to get charged for keying in your bank card pin incorrectly.

It is normal… in that everyone does it.

So everyone accepts it.

You fat-finger your four digits, you get a fine.

Not a big fine. But a fine.

Nobody is taking to the streets about this because it is normal.

Or it was, until now.

Because the team I was speaking to are having none of that and the product they are building is not going to levy that (and many other unnecessary charges). They will still be profitable and compliant, but they will not succumb to this ‘normal’.

And in so doing, they challenge and redefine what is normal in their market.

Because normal is nothing more than what everyone is doing.

Until someone stops.

And change occurs. And a new normal emerges.

What happens between one normal and the next isn’t in itself normal. And it is not comfortable or predictable. And it can go wrong. But it is where innovation, invention and evolution happens. Just before the new normal emerges. In that precarious place that opens up when someone goes, “There has to be another way.”

#LedaWrites

Leda Glyptis is FinTech Futures’ resident thought provocateur – she leads, writes on, lives and breathes transformation and digital disruption.

She is a recovering banker, lapsed academic and long-term resident of the banking ecosystem. 

Leda is also a published author – her first book, Bankers Like Us: Dispatches from an Industry in Transition, is available to order here.

All opinions are her own. You can’t have them – but you are welcome to debate and comment!

Follow Leda on X @LedaGlyptis and LinkedIn.