Strategies for innovating into the future:
Global futurist and author Jack Uldrich offers essential strategic information on nanotechnology, robotics, biotechnology, RFID and many other future technologies to help you prosper as exponential trends converge at this unique moment in history.
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Future Technology Blog Recent Posts
Think About the Future, Today
Effective today, June 8, 2009, General Motors and Citigroup are no longer components of the Dow 30. In and of itself this news has no great relevance, but it does highlight how fast today’s economy continues to change. As I mentioned the other day, many people think that ”tomorrow will be pretty much like yesterday.” This simply isn’t true.
One strategy I have advocated for thinking about the future is to ”develop a future bias.” As a thought exercise and to help you “jump the curve,” I’d like to suggest a second exercise: review the members of the current Dow 30 and imagine which company will be the next to be removed from the list and explain why it might go. (For extra credit, I invite you to imagine which company might replace it.) The purpose of this exercise is to force you what of your comfort zone and come face-to-face with the reality that “the only constant is change.”
To help you get started, here are some possibilities. Advances in nanotechnology could cause many of the materials Alcoa makes to become either irrelevant or obsolete, and the company will be replaced by a nanomaterial company. Or perhaps Caterpillar will not remain competitive due to advances in robotics and it will be replaced by iRobot. A third alternative is that intense competition from Nokia will wreak havoc on both AT&T and Verizon and they will be replaced on the Dow 30 by Google, which may continue to make strides in the communication field with its new Android platform. A fourth possibility is that new advances in biotechnology will render many existing drugs obsolete and Pfizer will be replaced on the Dow 30 with a biotech company such as Genentech.
Really, there is no shortage of possibilities but one of the best ways to prepare for the future is to simply acknowledge that it is going to change. And, as Darwin said: “It is not the strongest of a species that survives, nor is it the fittest; it is those that can adapt the fastest.” Are you and your organization prepared to adapt? Quickly?
If not, you could go the way of General Motors.
Related Posts
Cultivate a Beginner’s Mind
Never Let Your Ego Stop You From Unlearning
Find Some Zero-Gravity Thinkers
Don‘t Incrementalize Yourself into the Future
Think 10X, Not 10%
A Useful Anology for Thinking About the Future
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I was thinking of the future in terms of social and technological changes. In that respect, “think about the future” is less of a goal, more a state of mind, and I’ve been in that state of mind since I was four..Personal Injury Lawyer Houston
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I was thinking of the future in terms of social and technological changes.Social Media Optimization company
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i know science has made some advances in robotics and it won’t be long before we do have robots doing more common tasks, but I dunno about being cops and soldiers and stuff. That means they would actually be able to think and reason and be intuitive. I don’t think that’ll ever happen....Online universities
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I was thinking of the future in terms of social and technological changes. In that respect,think about the future is less of a goal,more a state of mind,and i have been in that state of mind since i was four.
regards
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By Online Schools on 2009 08 04