My latest interview with Pam Atherton of A Closer Look Radio, covering the superconnection between peak oil, European fiscal crises, local economics, and even the iPad. It’s all about institutions in transition and what you will do to assure your future success.
Everybody wants a profitable, just, humane, creative, interesting, healthy future – it’s just that while we are working in groups to achieve it, a bunch of other stuff happens along the way. Such is life in a world defined by bureaucracy, and instead of complaining about it, we need to realize why we’re having so much trouble actually thinking about the future. Until we recognize our collective problems, all the trends and scenarios in the world won’t help us create organizations with a strong sense of foresight.
The above statement is the central thesis for my next book, which will be a detailed, rich manual on exactly how NOT to study the future. I have identified twenty-five common traps into which leaders fall when attempting to think about the future. Before you get flogged with any more reports about nanogenetics or the rise of the Ghanaian automobile industry or reports on cell phones implanted in your molars, we need to look back at the past fifty years of futurism and see why it didn’t necessarily result in a world full of visionary futurists.
Given my new mission, I was excited to find this beautifully-presented look at cognitive bias in groups. The authors outline for us all the ways our group dynamics can result in dangerously inaccurate thoughts about the future:
I love this presentation in the way in does not invite to blame or ridicule – these are natural phenomena that occur within groups of people. I may have committed 75 of these mistakes before breakfast myself – it’s that easy. When we come around to such self-analysis with a touch of humor and understanding, we may finally be in a position to move on to organizations that are more sophisticated and more effective.
Cognitive Biases – A Visual Study Guide by the Royal Society of Account Planning
I spoke recently with an American diplomat who outlined the larger importance of having the European currency succeed. Her concern is for the geopolitical balance that will be affected if the eurozone is not stabilized.
“Think of the Euro currency as the first baby in a marriage. Sure, there’s a difference between marriage and dating, but a baby is a real, concrete, serious output from that union, a tangible expression of your interaction. Think of the countries of Europe as participants in a somewhat new marriage. Right now, if the euro turns out to be a failure, if it is no longer considered as a reserve currency, it will be significant embarrassment on the parents – sort of like if their first kid ends up in prison.
Before, the European nations were just dating, nothing serious. They allowed passport-free travel between countries; they liberalized trade policies and labor pools; they didn’t go to war for the first time in a while. This currency has been their first major project as a group. Even their military assistance in Afghanistan isn’t truly an expression of Europe as a force – it is a NATO action. The currency, on the other hand, is designed to show Europe as a major economic counterbalance to China, Japan, and the United States. If that currency fails on the first try, essentially the rest of the world may – rightfully – see Europe as a collection of diverse states that are not able to coordinate even simple policies.
The world may be left with a more bipolar world between China and the U.S., with Europe left as nothing more than a tourist destination full of aging populations and delicious cheeses.”
Time to put your scenario-planning hats on, especially if Europe figures prominently as a market or as a supplier for your organization.
Often, I think the 21st century may look increasingly like the 19th. Sure, there’s the dominance of coal in the developing world. There’s unprecedented globalization. European disintegration. Resurgence of local agriculture. All this, plus world health is considerably better. Not a bad future, necessarily.
In the musical world, there is a recent event that hearkens back to the 19th century days of the player piano, but will 21st century elegance and complexity. Pat Metheny, one of the top guitarists and composers in the world, has experimented for years with MIDI (Musical Instrument Digital Interface), the technology that allows musicians to connect directly to synthesizers, samplers, and recording devices. This year, his vision has gone steampunk – the Orchestrion project, a centrally-coordinated digital orchestra that triggers actual instruments instead of their synthesized counterparts.
Watch the video – this is an incredibly beautiful sounding vision by a mad professor bent on calling back a more elegant age.
Beats talking about housing and finance for a moment.