I am a strong believer in the power and value of understanding personality and cognitive styles as a part of effective work in exploring the future. That’s true even if you are working alone–you need to know your own mind in doing futures work. Are you a black and white thinker, or do you see [...]
At the center of exploring the future is a permanent need, one that transcends everything else. That is the need to think new thoughts. The one certainty about the future is that things will be different. Because of that, we need to be sure we try out new thinking, even though we are unsure about [...]
Five or six times a year I lead workshops with groups in organizations. Usually the stated goal is to find new opportunities for growth, based on the trends and forces the organizations face in the next few years.
One nearly universal discovery they make, however, is that they are stuck. There are lots of reasons why [...]
I spend a lot of time thinking about effective communication in exploring the future, and have posted a number of entries on it (see: communication). Every time I give a talk or lead a workshop, I try to up my game and reflect on how it went, what worked, and what didn’t. I consider the [...]
While at home the other morning, I walked by my 9-year-old’s microscope left on the kitchen counter. Normally, clutter and forgotten belongings plague me at home, but I had the thought, what kind of Dad would tell his curious son, “put your damn microscope away!”? Wouldn’t that be like Louis Armstrong’s Mom saying “stop playing [...]
And now for something completely different…..
I regularly give talks on the future. I’ve spoken to groups from second grade to senior citizens. I have given talks to members of dozens of professions, in different industries, and in different countries. I have evolved my approach over the years in an effort to make it work as [...]
Every time I have used versions of the diagram shown here with groups in workshops, conversations, and consulting visits, it has always helped to clarify and solidify people’s thinking. The other day, in a typical business workshop setting, I introduced it, and as I drew the diagram on a flipchart, I heard one of the [...]
It’s hard to open up a discussion about the future and not put most everything on the table for reconsideration. When the way is clear to do that, great, go for it! But so often, the charge to the group exploring the future is to move more incrementally: find new opportunities for growth, is a [...]
DUSTIN, of the blog Casual Fridays, offers some great wisdom on why new ideas (yours!) can fall flat with your colleagues. His post is well worth a look if you have to communicate about the future. I am certain I’ve experienced each one of these problems in my work as a futurist, and most of [...]
In writing scenarios, it’s particularly tough to decide how transformative or “extreme” to be. That’s because scenarios are not predictions, they are tools for thought-for exploring the possibilities, and contrasting outcomes. In using scenarios, we have to be ready to distinguish, and help others distinguish, how we are saying not what will happen, but rather [...]
