The more I read about immigration, the more I realize how outdated my experience growing up is.

When I look back at the class I joined when I arrived in Germany, I was the only foreigner. Some of my classmates had foreign roots, but I was the only one who didn’t know German when I entered school. The only religion taught in my school was Christianity. Our class was split into two variants of it and it was straightforward for everyone to know which class to attend. My parents decided that to fit in, I would participate in the class attended by Catholic children, as far as I remember, I was the only one who wasn’t baptized.

The situation is very different today. I just need to look into my neighborhood. The number of nationalities exploded, and the same is true for religions. And even looking at those of German nationality, there is an astonishing number of people of different origins.

But when I think about school today, the only experience I have is my own. Should I try to use this experience to help others address their current reality at school, I will likely not be of much help.

The situation in school evolved way too fast for my experience to be comparable to the experience children have today. The change we are experiencing all over the world, globalization and its consequences, is transforming the complexity in every classroom. It’s also transforming how I can use my own experience.

And this is only one field in which my strategy for dealing with reality needs to and had to change.

The same is true for leaders and organizations. It’s not so much what an employee joining an organization wants. It’s just as much what the organization needs to adapt to fulfill its purpose.