A forecast is not meant to predict the future, but rather provide a plausible scenario to challenge assumptions and inspire new ways of thinking. Forecasts are intended to highlight ambiguities and dilemmas, recognizing there are multiple potential futures rather than a single prediction. An effective forecast stimulates innovation by provoking thought about issues like how to involve retired baby boomers in society in creative new ways that redefine retirement. While a forecast does not need to come true, it can still be useful by opening minds to new perspectives and possibilities for the present.
Did you know that most innovators developed their concepts in their 20s? There’s a reason for that. They were able to successfully access their greatest app – a different part of their mind – on demand.
Our colleague, Bill Donius, was recently chosen to highlight a proven facilitation process to break through established habits and routines at a TED Talk.
This approach, based on a Nobel prize winning discovery, has now been applied to business. Using such will ensure you get truly different points of view, even among large groups, through your most powerful app – your mind. This is the essence of “thinking outside the box.”
You can use our techniques, based on 50 years of scientific research, to organize your teams to address key business challenges, including strategic planning, marketing and brand strategy and customer experience management.
This document provides a collection of tips and concepts for business and personal life. Some key points include: do not reply immediately to something that irritates you; give projects and subjects to team members to observe their reactions; leave some free space for team members; when issues occur stay calm, get experts involved, troubleshoot, fix issues, and have lessons learned sessions; do not interrupt those trying to understand and fix issues; do not get stuck on issues and take breaks if needed; keep a balance between professional and personal life; trust is key but also requires some control; understand the roles in drama-intense relationships; visibility of invisible factors is important; start somewhere and progress constantly; be prepared for changes; technology is just a
Designed to help nonprofit and foundation leaders design bold new strategies. Based on 12 thought-inspiring questions to get to a Simple Unifying Idea.
Creativity involves imagining or inventing something new through flexible and original thinking. It brings new products, processes, or ideas into existence. The creative process evolves ideas through preparation, incubation, illumination, and verification stages. Preparation involves investigating problems, incubation allows unconscious thought, illumination sparks insights, and verification implements and tests ideas. Creativity relies on imagination, which can envision nonexistent objects and fill knowledge gaps, while creativity produces tangible outcomes. Imagination types include effectuative, intellectual, fantasy, empathy, strategic, emotional, dreams, and memory reconstruction.
When we talk about work-life balance, we all struggle with balancing work and the rest of our responsibilities. When work crowds out everything else, we find ourselves unfulfilled, overwhelmed, or stagnant because we’re sacrificing growth in other areas. We feel disconnected from people who matter to us It’s not easy to fit in everything that’s important, and all too often, we view the problem as a set of trade-offs
So this guide helps in understanding that how we can be productive and create balance in all the four domains of life which are Work, Life, Community, and Self.
This document discusses various topics related to project, program and portfolio management including applying benefits realization management, focusing on outcomes rather than costs and risks, embracing challenges, and never stopping learning. It also recommends the book "Getting Things Done" by David Allen as a method to free your mind from clutter and focus. PMOs are said to exist within wider organizational ecosystems and the smallest acts that drive strategic execution are individual choices of what to work on. Creating shared purpose is more important than sharing thoughts.
The presentation is a part of strategic planning exercise carried out by organizations and individuals to achieve long terms business and personal goals.
Did you know that most innovators developed their concepts in their 20s? There’s a reason for that. They were able to successfully access their greatest app – a different part of their mind – on demand.
Our colleague, Bill Donius, was recently chosen to highlight a proven facilitation process to break through established habits and routines at a TED Talk.
This approach, based on a Nobel prize winning discovery, has now been applied to business. Using such will ensure you get truly different points of view, even among large groups, through your most powerful app – your mind. This is the essence of “thinking outside the box.”
You can use our techniques, based on 50 years of scientific research, to organize your teams to address key business challenges, including strategic planning, marketing and brand strategy and customer experience management.
This document provides a collection of tips and concepts for business and personal life. Some key points include: do not reply immediately to something that irritates you; give projects and subjects to team members to observe their reactions; leave some free space for team members; when issues occur stay calm, get experts involved, troubleshoot, fix issues, and have lessons learned sessions; do not interrupt those trying to understand and fix issues; do not get stuck on issues and take breaks if needed; keep a balance between professional and personal life; trust is key but also requires some control; understand the roles in drama-intense relationships; visibility of invisible factors is important; start somewhere and progress constantly; be prepared for changes; technology is just a
Designed to help nonprofit and foundation leaders design bold new strategies. Based on 12 thought-inspiring questions to get to a Simple Unifying Idea.
Creativity involves imagining or inventing something new through flexible and original thinking. It brings new products, processes, or ideas into existence. The creative process evolves ideas through preparation, incubation, illumination, and verification stages. Preparation involves investigating problems, incubation allows unconscious thought, illumination sparks insights, and verification implements and tests ideas. Creativity relies on imagination, which can envision nonexistent objects and fill knowledge gaps, while creativity produces tangible outcomes. Imagination types include effectuative, intellectual, fantasy, empathy, strategic, emotional, dreams, and memory reconstruction.
When we talk about work-life balance, we all struggle with balancing work and the rest of our responsibilities. When work crowds out everything else, we find ourselves unfulfilled, overwhelmed, or stagnant because we’re sacrificing growth in other areas. We feel disconnected from people who matter to us It’s not easy to fit in everything that’s important, and all too often, we view the problem as a set of trade-offs
So this guide helps in understanding that how we can be productive and create balance in all the four domains of life which are Work, Life, Community, and Self.
This document discusses various topics related to project, program and portfolio management including applying benefits realization management, focusing on outcomes rather than costs and risks, embracing challenges, and never stopping learning. It also recommends the book "Getting Things Done" by David Allen as a method to free your mind from clutter and focus. PMOs are said to exist within wider organizational ecosystems and the smallest acts that drive strategic execution are individual choices of what to work on. Creating shared purpose is more important than sharing thoughts.
The presentation is a part of strategic planning exercise carried out by organizations and individuals to achieve long terms business and personal goals.
The document outlines six activities that can help organizations with foresight: framing, scanning, forecasting, visioning, planning, and acting. Framing involves adjusting attitudes, understanding objectives, and creating strategic work environments. Scanning requires mapping systems, studying history, scanning environments, and involving colleagues. Forecasting identifies drivers and uncertainties to generate and prioritize alternative futures. Visioning identifies implications and assumptions to develop visionary thinking. Planning develops strategic options. Acting communicates results, creates action agendas and intelligence systems, and institutionalizes strategic thinking. The document provides percentages of benefits for each activity and contact information for Andy Hines of the University of Houston Foresight program.
Ideas have been the driving force of humanity. From a simple circular wheel carved from rock back in the stone ages to the first airplanes and telephones, innovative ideas have sparked off revolutionary changes in society. Now in this competitive world, ideas have become more important to us than actions. Companies have begun asking designers to generate solutions that meet the needs and desires of the consumer.
As such, there was a need to streamline and increase the efficiency of producing and sharing ideas within teams. This gave birth to several idea generation techniques, which allowed everyone to play a part in the creative process, a role allotted strictly to designers and engineers for the last few years.
Idea generation techniques meant anyone could participate in creating new ideas. It allowed people to share and build up on existing solutions, to foresee future problems, and essentially, to think big in terms of design. It brought different specializations together to create a more diverse think-tank that can tackle problems from several perspectives.
This report is divided into three parts.
First, we shall look into several idea generation techniques, both popular ones and the uncommon ones, question their uses and value by providing examples of products developed using the specific techniques.
Second, we discuss whether idea generation methods and techniques are important in coming up with new ideas? Are they the driving factor in generating ideas?
Lastly, we conclude with our personal view on idea generation techniques, along with stating which methods, if any, would we prefer to use.
Towards the end we aim to achieve a better understand of the creative thinking process as a whole and how to effectively solve all issues, design or otherwise.
World-class organizations and teams have learned that the key to success is continuously advancing the competencies of their people. This presentation provides a deeper look at building people using proven PDCA learning cycles.
This 3-day training course teaches participants how to navigate complexity in teams and organizations. It uses the Complexity Compass framework, which provides principles, activities, and tools. The first day covers understanding the nature of complexity. The second day focuses on sensemaking and orientation in complex environments. The third day examines how to develop organizations to absorb complexity. The course is interactive and uses Cynefin playing cards to explore examples of ordered and complex domains. The goal is to help professionals address complex challenges through an experience-based approach.
Innovation - thriving in the realm of uncertaintyAlastair Lee
To be successful innovators we must be content to operate with limited information. A master at this is Daniel Kish - a blind man who can ride bikes, climb trees and go for hikes in the woods un-aided. What can we learn from him?
The document discusses decision making and why 45% of decisions are wrong. It outlines various steps, stages, and factors to consider in the decision making process. These include defining the problem, analyzing causes, considering possible solutions, assigning responsibilities, evaluating results, and testing outcomes. It also discusses cognitive biases and heuristics that can lead to irrational decisions, such as overconfidence in intuition, the illusion of understanding, and substituting easier questions for difficult ones. The document emphasizes reflecting on past decisions and their consequences to make improved choices going forward.
The document provides an overview of decision making. It discusses that decision making involves both system 1 intuitive thinking and system 2 analytical thinking. It notes that overestimating intuition and underestimating what is needed for analytical thinking can lead to irrational perseverance. The document outlines several biases and errors that affect decision making, such as overconfidence, focusing on known information while neglecting unknowns, and substitution of easier questions for more difficult ones. It emphasizes that decision making is improved by reflecting on decisions, getting feedback, and revising approaches when needed.
Creativity Inc. is an autobiography by Ed Catmull, co-founder of Pixar. This book is very helpful for us when we wants to build something meaningful that will outlast us. Be it advance manufacturing or new innovation in technology. It explains, what it takes to build and sustain a culture of excellence, one that embraces originality in its truest form. I highly recommend this book. It has applicable ideas, but more than anything it will broaden our view of why success in itself isn’t all that interesting; sustaining it is.
Key Learnings
>Eight mechanisms for new perspectives
>Honesty and Candour
>Change and Randomness
>Fear and Failure
>Starting Points
A slide show on imagination where we were trying to show that creativity and imagination lead to value added through innovation but imagination must come first.
Economic Uncertainty by RAM CHARAN Book summaryDr. N. Asokan
The document discusses the challenges of leadership during economic uncertainty and volatility. It provides advice for CEOs and other leaders on how to manage their companies during difficult times. Some of the key points made include:
1) Leaders must make bold changes, including cutting costs and raising cash, to prepare their companies for potential worst-case scenarios. They need to continuously monitor the situation and be willing to change strategies quickly.
2) CEOs should communicate frequently with employees, be highly involved in operations, and make decisions with speed. They must also inspire confidence during uncertain times.
3) Financial managers must focus intensely on cash generation and conservation. All parts of the company need to work together towards this goal of cutting
Scenario planning is a foresight methodology that uses scenarios to explore plausible futures. It helps decision-makers prepare for an uncertain future. The scenario planning process involves: 1) researching driving forces of change, 2) determining how these forces may interact to shape different futures, 3) creating narrative scenarios, 4) analyzing the implications of each scenario, 5) evaluating the scenarios, and 6) monitoring indicators to check progress and revise plans accordingly.
The document provides guidance on facilitating online agile retrospectives. It discusses the roles of the facilitator as architect, pilot and guide. It emphasizes that online facilitation is not the same as in-person and suggests considering digital constraints and interactive approaches. The document then outlines the typical stages of a retrospective - set the stage, gather data, generate insights, decide what to do, and close out - and provides tips for each stage. It aims to help facilitators effectively lead remote retrospectives.
This document provides guidance on identifying and solving problems using the A3 problem-solving template. It emphasizes that successful problem-solving requires understanding the current conditions and goals, using data to identify the root causes, developing countermeasures through experimentation, and following up to ensure the problem is resolved. The overall message is that problems should be viewed as learning opportunities, countermeasures should be tested through a scientific process, and continuous improvement requires sustaining progress through review and celebration.
This document discusses strategies for effective data governance and data science. It argues that traditional data governance focuses only on symptoms and not root causes of data science failures. Effective data strategy requires understanding meaning in data, developing expert intuition over time, and allowing heterotopias for non-standard exploration. Data scientists must blend past and future methods during times of atemporality. Effective hiring strategies should sell mission, promote role crafting, and facilitate growth in a changing environment.
Exploring the Fertile Boundaries Between Faith and Business // #leanfaithLean Startup Co.
Ken Howard, FaithX , @paradoxy101
Toby Rubin, UpStart Bay Area , @upstartbayarea
Spencer Burke, Hatchery LA , @hatchery_la
Author, extrapreneurial faith leader, and church futurist, Ken Howard, will lead a curated discussion of the fertile ground that lies at the boundaries of faith and business. He will be joined by entrepreneur and community innovator Toby Rubin, of UpStart Bay Area, and innovator and author Spencer Burke, of HatcheryLA. Topics like: Experimental Faith-Based Communities & Organizations, Lean in the Jewish Space, and Incubation & Acceleration of Faith Communities are just a few of the things Ken and his guests will be discussing at this first-of-its-kind program at the Lean Startup Conference.
Caring For The Innovator, Caring For Innovation Powerpoint For Dnp CourseDaniel Weberg
This document discusses innovation in healthcare and how to support innovators. It defines innovation as creating new processes or values that improve resources and defines the innovator as frontline healthcare workers. It argues that innovation can exist with policies if there is a balance between stability and change. It provides five strategies to care for innovators: giving autonomy and being open, providing support and respect, having patience and honesty, and valuing mistakes. The key is adapting policies quickly to reflect innovation and challenging outdated policies.
This document provides information about a course on future carving. The course aims to help individuals visualize and plan their desired future through goal setting and action planning. It involves writing goals in detail and specifying actions to achieve them. The learning outcomes include developing clarity around goals and plans. The course content covers topics like thinking strategies, logical and creative thinking, decision making, and developing an action plan. It discusses techniques for envisioning the future, overcoming blocks to thinking, and taking assertive action.
Unleash the Beast is a book written to help you optimize every part of you, mental, spiritual, physical, so you can unlock the enormous potential lying untapped within you.
The document outlines six activities that can help organizations with foresight: framing, scanning, forecasting, visioning, planning, and acting. Framing involves adjusting attitudes, understanding objectives, and creating strategic work environments. Scanning requires mapping systems, studying history, scanning environments, and involving colleagues. Forecasting identifies drivers and uncertainties to generate and prioritize alternative futures. Visioning identifies implications and assumptions to develop visionary thinking. Planning develops strategic options. Acting communicates results, creates action agendas and intelligence systems, and institutionalizes strategic thinking. The document provides percentages of benefits for each activity and contact information for Andy Hines of the University of Houston Foresight program.
Ideas have been the driving force of humanity. From a simple circular wheel carved from rock back in the stone ages to the first airplanes and telephones, innovative ideas have sparked off revolutionary changes in society. Now in this competitive world, ideas have become more important to us than actions. Companies have begun asking designers to generate solutions that meet the needs and desires of the consumer.
As such, there was a need to streamline and increase the efficiency of producing and sharing ideas within teams. This gave birth to several idea generation techniques, which allowed everyone to play a part in the creative process, a role allotted strictly to designers and engineers for the last few years.
Idea generation techniques meant anyone could participate in creating new ideas. It allowed people to share and build up on existing solutions, to foresee future problems, and essentially, to think big in terms of design. It brought different specializations together to create a more diverse think-tank that can tackle problems from several perspectives.
This report is divided into three parts.
First, we shall look into several idea generation techniques, both popular ones and the uncommon ones, question their uses and value by providing examples of products developed using the specific techniques.
Second, we discuss whether idea generation methods and techniques are important in coming up with new ideas? Are they the driving factor in generating ideas?
Lastly, we conclude with our personal view on idea generation techniques, along with stating which methods, if any, would we prefer to use.
Towards the end we aim to achieve a better understand of the creative thinking process as a whole and how to effectively solve all issues, design or otherwise.
World-class organizations and teams have learned that the key to success is continuously advancing the competencies of their people. This presentation provides a deeper look at building people using proven PDCA learning cycles.
This 3-day training course teaches participants how to navigate complexity in teams and organizations. It uses the Complexity Compass framework, which provides principles, activities, and tools. The first day covers understanding the nature of complexity. The second day focuses on sensemaking and orientation in complex environments. The third day examines how to develop organizations to absorb complexity. The course is interactive and uses Cynefin playing cards to explore examples of ordered and complex domains. The goal is to help professionals address complex challenges through an experience-based approach.
Innovation - thriving in the realm of uncertaintyAlastair Lee
To be successful innovators we must be content to operate with limited information. A master at this is Daniel Kish - a blind man who can ride bikes, climb trees and go for hikes in the woods un-aided. What can we learn from him?
The document discusses decision making and why 45% of decisions are wrong. It outlines various steps, stages, and factors to consider in the decision making process. These include defining the problem, analyzing causes, considering possible solutions, assigning responsibilities, evaluating results, and testing outcomes. It also discusses cognitive biases and heuristics that can lead to irrational decisions, such as overconfidence in intuition, the illusion of understanding, and substituting easier questions for difficult ones. The document emphasizes reflecting on past decisions and their consequences to make improved choices going forward.
The document provides an overview of decision making. It discusses that decision making involves both system 1 intuitive thinking and system 2 analytical thinking. It notes that overestimating intuition and underestimating what is needed for analytical thinking can lead to irrational perseverance. The document outlines several biases and errors that affect decision making, such as overconfidence, focusing on known information while neglecting unknowns, and substitution of easier questions for more difficult ones. It emphasizes that decision making is improved by reflecting on decisions, getting feedback, and revising approaches when needed.
Creativity Inc. is an autobiography by Ed Catmull, co-founder of Pixar. This book is very helpful for us when we wants to build something meaningful that will outlast us. Be it advance manufacturing or new innovation in technology. It explains, what it takes to build and sustain a culture of excellence, one that embraces originality in its truest form. I highly recommend this book. It has applicable ideas, but more than anything it will broaden our view of why success in itself isn’t all that interesting; sustaining it is.
Key Learnings
>Eight mechanisms for new perspectives
>Honesty and Candour
>Change and Randomness
>Fear and Failure
>Starting Points
A slide show on imagination where we were trying to show that creativity and imagination lead to value added through innovation but imagination must come first.
Economic Uncertainty by RAM CHARAN Book summaryDr. N. Asokan
The document discusses the challenges of leadership during economic uncertainty and volatility. It provides advice for CEOs and other leaders on how to manage their companies during difficult times. Some of the key points made include:
1) Leaders must make bold changes, including cutting costs and raising cash, to prepare their companies for potential worst-case scenarios. They need to continuously monitor the situation and be willing to change strategies quickly.
2) CEOs should communicate frequently with employees, be highly involved in operations, and make decisions with speed. They must also inspire confidence during uncertain times.
3) Financial managers must focus intensely on cash generation and conservation. All parts of the company need to work together towards this goal of cutting
Scenario planning is a foresight methodology that uses scenarios to explore plausible futures. It helps decision-makers prepare for an uncertain future. The scenario planning process involves: 1) researching driving forces of change, 2) determining how these forces may interact to shape different futures, 3) creating narrative scenarios, 4) analyzing the implications of each scenario, 5) evaluating the scenarios, and 6) monitoring indicators to check progress and revise plans accordingly.
The document provides guidance on facilitating online agile retrospectives. It discusses the roles of the facilitator as architect, pilot and guide. It emphasizes that online facilitation is not the same as in-person and suggests considering digital constraints and interactive approaches. The document then outlines the typical stages of a retrospective - set the stage, gather data, generate insights, decide what to do, and close out - and provides tips for each stage. It aims to help facilitators effectively lead remote retrospectives.
This document provides guidance on identifying and solving problems using the A3 problem-solving template. It emphasizes that successful problem-solving requires understanding the current conditions and goals, using data to identify the root causes, developing countermeasures through experimentation, and following up to ensure the problem is resolved. The overall message is that problems should be viewed as learning opportunities, countermeasures should be tested through a scientific process, and continuous improvement requires sustaining progress through review and celebration.
This document discusses strategies for effective data governance and data science. It argues that traditional data governance focuses only on symptoms and not root causes of data science failures. Effective data strategy requires understanding meaning in data, developing expert intuition over time, and allowing heterotopias for non-standard exploration. Data scientists must blend past and future methods during times of atemporality. Effective hiring strategies should sell mission, promote role crafting, and facilitate growth in a changing environment.
Exploring the Fertile Boundaries Between Faith and Business // #leanfaithLean Startup Co.
Ken Howard, FaithX , @paradoxy101
Toby Rubin, UpStart Bay Area , @upstartbayarea
Spencer Burke, Hatchery LA , @hatchery_la
Author, extrapreneurial faith leader, and church futurist, Ken Howard, will lead a curated discussion of the fertile ground that lies at the boundaries of faith and business. He will be joined by entrepreneur and community innovator Toby Rubin, of UpStart Bay Area, and innovator and author Spencer Burke, of HatcheryLA. Topics like: Experimental Faith-Based Communities & Organizations, Lean in the Jewish Space, and Incubation & Acceleration of Faith Communities are just a few of the things Ken and his guests will be discussing at this first-of-its-kind program at the Lean Startup Conference.
Caring For The Innovator, Caring For Innovation Powerpoint For Dnp CourseDaniel Weberg
This document discusses innovation in healthcare and how to support innovators. It defines innovation as creating new processes or values that improve resources and defines the innovator as frontline healthcare workers. It argues that innovation can exist with policies if there is a balance between stability and change. It provides five strategies to care for innovators: giving autonomy and being open, providing support and respect, having patience and honesty, and valuing mistakes. The key is adapting policies quickly to reflect innovation and challenging outdated policies.
This document provides information about a course on future carving. The course aims to help individuals visualize and plan their desired future through goal setting and action planning. It involves writing goals in detail and specifying actions to achieve them. The learning outcomes include developing clarity around goals and plans. The course content covers topics like thinking strategies, logical and creative thinking, decision making, and developing an action plan. It discusses techniques for envisioning the future, overcoming blocks to thinking, and taking assertive action.
Unleash the Beast is a book written to help you optimize every part of you, mental, spiritual, physical, so you can unlock the enormous potential lying untapped within you.
This document discusses creative problem solving and leadership. It outlines the 5 steps in the creative process as preparation, incubation, illumination, evaluation, and implementation. It then lists characteristics of creative leaders such as having a flexible thinking style, managing cultural barriers, and being able to consider multiple perspectives. Finally, it provides 7 strategies for creative thinking, which include embracing problems, challenging assumptions, taking risks, using alternative thinking, accepting ambiguity, expanding your vision, and massaging your brain waves.
THE LEADERSHIP TO CHANGE THE WOLRD THIS IS YOUR HOUR PURSUES YOUR GIFT, TALEN...PROF. PAUL ALLIEU KAMARA
INTRODUCTION
You are currently viewing How Can Great Leaders Change the World for the Better?
How Can Great Leaders Change the World for the Better?
People resist change. Whether it’s a small habitual change or a large societal change, our society is known for hindering this extraordinary process. While most people never try and some try and fail miserably, some are the torchbearers of change. These leaders envision a different world and then make their dreams come true.
That being said, this process is not easy. Leaders, even the most resilient ones, have to go through many challenges and face many hurdles before they can transform an organization or society. It may appear like a daunting task, but it is certainly not impossible.
If you want to make history and become one of the great leaders, you need to acquire certain success-worthy traits. We have highlighted all the information you need in this article. So without further ado, let’s get started.
9 Steps Leaders Can Champion Change
Most people want to bring about a substantial change. However, they lack the basic guidelines. Here are the 9 steps you need to follow if you want to be the torchbearers of change.
Identify the Problem: What Is Wrong With the Status Quo?
Be Courageous Enough to Challenge the Status Quo
Build a Team That Stands by You Through Thick and Thin
Lay Out a Clear Plan: Don’t Leave Anything to the Imagination
Be true to yourself
Celebrate small wins and always look forward
Cultivate inclusivity and diversity
Choose the right time to divulge information
Evolve and change with time
This document provides an introduction to the Theory of Constraints (TOC), a management philosophy focused on identifying and managing an organization's constraints to maximize throughput. The TOC defines five steps for ongoing improvement: identify the constraint, exploit the constraint, subordinate other processes, elevate the constraint, and avoid inertia. It also introduces Thinking Processes diagrams that use cause-and-effect logic to answer questions about what to change, to what to change, and how to cause the change. The goal is to give managers tools to simplify complex systems by focusing on key constraints.
This webinar discussed effective communication techniques for project managers. It emphasized that while functional tools like selecting the right communication medium are important, good communication form through dialogue, active listening, and being present are also critical. The webinar provided tips for defining problems clearly with stakeholders, overcoming obstacles to communication, and managing discomfort during challenging exchanges. The goal was to help project managers improve their most important skill of communicating across diverse project teams.
Perhaps the most intimidating aspect of leadership is knowing that in addition to playing an important role in a team’s success, leaders are held responsible for their team’s failures. In order to obtain great results from their teams, leaders must be able to consistently motivate their team members.
Knowledgeable workers must manage themselves.
Design thinking is a process that focuses on empathy, collaboration, and experimentation to solve problems in a human-centered way. It begins with deep understanding of users' needs through observation and engagement to gain insights. Teams then work together to synthesize learnings and define the key issues to address. The process is iterative, testing ideas and getting feedback to develop better solutions. Design thinking provides optimism that positive change is possible through a creative approach.
It’s a challenge for some people to find good business reasons for paying attention to emotions, but emotions are a key piece of data in a collection of information that can make or break your project.
Managing projects effectively doesn’t start with getting stakeholder buy-in. It starts with you. Before you can assess and tune into the emotions of others on your project, you must be aware and tuned into your own emotions first. We’ll take a look at how you can leverage your emotions and the emotions of others to successfully deliver projects.
We are proud to announce our eighth Innovation Excellence Weekly for Slideshare. Inside you'll find ten of the best innovation-related articles from the past week on Innovation Excellence - the world's most popular innovation web site and home to nearly 5,000 innovation-related articles.
Book summary - Perspectives on agility - Hrishikesh KarekarHrishikesh Karekar
Based on insights from years of agile coaching and leading large agile transformations, Perspectives on agility provides a point of view on some of the crucial aspects that leaders, coaches, and agile practitioners need to focus on in their journey for business agility.
Leadership and Management of Innovation (Eric James)Eric James
The leadership and management that supports and enables innovation can be a significant challenge. Being a truly effective leader involves a series of steps that are captured here in the INSPIRE framework. This involves working from the "inside out" (i.e., innovative leaders know that excellence starts with themselves), knowing the context, being able to effectively strategize, preparation, generating and integrating good ideas, re-examining the approach and executing plans effectively.
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Neuroscience offers some new insights into the challenge of change and strategy execution in organisations. This article, part 1 of a three part series, explores why people cannot see the future as clearly as the change leader expects.
This presentation was given as part of OEDA's Basic Economic Development Training in March, 2014. The text underneath the slide should give you an explanation of what I said on each slide. Note that the text underneath tries to differentiate between what I thought students needed to be aware of in order to succeed on the professional exam for the CEcD certification, and what I thought needed to happen in real life. So it's a little schitzophrenic. Sorry. To learn more about how I actually think this stuff should be done, check out wiseeconomy.com
Todd Henry's book The Accidental Creative argues that creativity is not limited to just advertising and design professionals. It believes that if you solve problems, develop strategies, or strain your brain for new ideas, you are a creative. The book outlines Todd Henry's concept of establishing a FRESH creative rhythm through focusing on Focus, Relationships, Energy, Stimuli, and Hours. This rhythm aims to provide stability and clarity to consistently engage problems and unleash creative potential. The summary effectively captures the key ideas and arguments presented in the document in a concise manner within 3 sentences.
20151207 coaching community of practice tony llano _ prepared_comments _ ...Anthony N. Llano
1) The document discusses the importance of defining strategy and strategic thinking. It states that strategy is about making choices, especially about what not to do, with a focus on the future context.
2) It argues that everyone has the potential to think strategically since we all make choices everyday. Strategic thinking can be applied not just to business but also personal growth and coaching.
3) The questions and answers section discusses keeping informed to make better choices, asking meaningful questions to help people see their reality differently, and using NeuroLeadership models and dialogue to help "coachees" achieve their goals.
We are proud to announce our 35th Innovation Excellence Weekly for Slideshare. Inside you'll find ten of the best innovation-related articles from the past week on Innovation Excellence - the world's most popular innovation web site and home to 5,500+ innovation-related articles.
Strategic planning annotated oeda mar 2014Della Rucker
This document provides an annotated summary of a presentation on strategic planning. It begins with an introduction of the presenter's background and emphasizes that the economic development certification exam is based entirely on the content of the IEDC book and requires knowing the concepts, not just examples seen in presentations. The summary then walks through the key points made in the presentation, which highlights sections from the IEDC book on defining goals, priorities, and realistic plans. It stresses the importance of strategic plans for focusing limited resources and setting priorities to balance competing interests. The presentation cautions that those creating strategic plans must avoid becoming dictators by building plans collaboratively and recognizing plans will never be perfect.
Leadership Decision Making and the Power of Observation.pdfFuwadBeg1
Our world is in perpetual motion, constantly changing and ever evolving.
For leaders, this momentum is relentless and brings an infinite number of challenges and opportunities.
By understanding how to harness this momentum; how to adapt in ambiguity and complexity whilst simultaneously preparing for what future challenges lie ahead is the very essence of leadership.
The following article explores leadership decision making and the power of observation as a distinction in making better decisions.
When we discuss our decision-making processes we generally believe we are objective in our approach and that somehow we are without preconceptions.
The reality, however, is that we make a decision based upon well-trodden behavioral patterns, through learned behavioral outcomes and well-established neural pathways built through repetitious triggers throughout our lives, creating our own standard process of decision making.
As leaders when we are faced with ambiguous challenges, we use our own standards based upon our past experiences to formulate our future responses.
By building reflective meta cognitive learning processes in our decision making we can become better at understanding ourselves and our biases and thus how we make decisions.
This is a deep topic and this article in a humble manner only explores the surface...
Read, enjoy, observe, reflect and learn.
This document discusses information ecosystems and the 8 critical flows of information within these systems. It provides examples of how information ecosystems function in conflict areas like the Central African Republic. Specifically, it notes that in CAR, community radios, correspondents, local authorities, humanitarian organizations, and local communities all play a role in the production and sharing of information. It also discusses how technologies like humanitarian maps can help facilitate the flows of information between humanitarian groups, local communities, and donors. The document explores how social media content online can influence offline situations and vice versa using South Sudan as an example.
Open Data for Development Challenge - CanadaAnahi Iacucci
The Open Data for Development Challenge event, took place in Montreal on January 27th and 28th. The event, in the form of a "codathon", focused on data, policy, and technical questions related to aid and transparency.
Anahi Ayala Iacucci has extensive experience in humanitarian aid, human rights, and information management. She currently serves as the Humanitarian Director for Internews in South Sudan, overseeing humanitarian projects providing information to communities affected by conflict. Previously, she held positions with the World Bank, Freedom House, and Ushahidi, focusing on using new technologies and crowdsourcing to support humanitarian efforts and monitor human rights issues.
I gave this presentation to broadcasters from 17 countries that participated in a workshop on Emergency and Disaster Management in Port of Spain, Trinidad. The workshop, held on October 29 and 30, was organized by the CBA and the Caribbean Broadcasting Union (CBU) to introduce current expertise and share best practices for use before, during and after emergencies for Caribbean broadcasters.
Listening to the Crowd: verification of Social Media ContentAnahi Iacucci
This presentation was given at Tech@State in Washington DC in 2013. The presentation covers the basics of how to verify information gathered via social media.
Innovative Approaches to M&E and Project DesignAnahi Iacucci
This presentation uses two examples of projects covered by Internews to talk about the use of ICTs for M&E and innovative approaches to evaluate and collect data for Monitoring and Evaluation purposes.
Humanitarian emergencies: searching for Open Data - OKCon2013Anahi Iacucci
While a growing conversation is happening around Open Data as a driver for development and accountability, little, if any, is being said about the role of open data in humanitarian emergencies. While we ask governments to open all their data as a duty towards their citizens, humanitarian organizations seems to be pretty much left outside. Is there a need for open data in the humanitarian community space? What would it look like? Are transparency and accountability strictly linked to the healthy recovery of communities in emergencies? This talk will look at some of those questions and try to propose some solutions, drawing from the long-standing experience that Internews has in media and communication with communities during emergencies.
This is a presentation I gave at the OKCon on a Meetup on GeoData moderated by Hannes Gassert, Open Knowledge Foundation Switzerland and with Barbara J. Ryan, Secretariat Director of the intergovernmental Group on Earth Observations (GEO), former Director of the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) Space Programme, Francesco Pisano, Director of Research United Nations Institute for Training and Research (UNITAR), responsible for UNOSAT, Emanuele Gennai, Esri Global Affairs Executive as panelists.
Geographic data has become key for a wide range of applications: almost everything people do happens in space. Understanding a city, a refugee camp, or an illegal settlement would not be possible without well managed geodata. Such geo data thus is very valuable indeed, and is considered proprietary, although it’s usually captured and managed with public effort. On the other hand everybody with a GPS device can become an online map maker almost instantly, and powerful community efforts have already created impressive results. During humanitarian or environmental crises, readily available open data and data sharing is needed urgently, and at scale – better data fast literally saves lives, and collaborative efforts are very much needed for an effective disaster response. This meetup brought together four panelists, each of them having unique geo data stories to share. Panelists were asked how open geodata is important to their activities, how they managed to achieve open geodata goals, and what challenges they faced while developing open geodata policies and systems.
Communication with Communities: C4D Unicef WorkshopAnahi Iacucci
This document discusses Internews' 30 years of work improving humanitarian assistance through enhanced communication between aid agencies and crisis-affected populations. It provides examples of projects in Central African Republic, Dadaab refugee camp in Kenya, and Mali that set up radio networks and trained journalists and aid workers to foster two-way information sharing. A program in Chad called "Carrefour des femmes" used a local radio station to discuss issues important to refugee women such as health, education, and empowerment. The document emphasizes that the goal is not just giving people a voice but focusing on effective communication between communities and aid organizations to improve crisis response.
Crowdsourcing, Mapping and Verification - PICNIC2012Anahi Iacucci
Crowdsourced information can play a crucial role in unexpected circumstances like political uprisings and natural disasters. But how can the data best be verified and what is the role of the media?With the expansion of social media and live mapping, crowdsourced information has begun to play a significant role in sudden, unexpected circumstances such as natural disasters and political uprisings. So is it possible for humans to replace algorithms in certain situations? Volunteer contributions have the potential to save lives and support local communities, but the real challenge is verifying crowdsourced information and "big data" – particularly in crisis situations requiring accurate validation under significant time constraints.
Preventing Conflict with the right information - UNDP WorkshopAnahi Iacucci
This document discusses using human-centered design to understand how communities access and share information. It proposes conducting field research through observation, interviews, and surveys to identify key themes like information flows, trust in sources, influence of sources, and changing technology behaviors. The goal is to develop improved programs and initiatives that are based on communities' actual needs, capacities, and cultural contexts to have higher impact. Design research is recommended to put people at the heart of problem-solving and take a systems approach to identifying opportunities for impact.
The document discusses several pilot projects conducted by an innovation center within a media organization to connect communities in conflict-affected areas using mobile and communication technologies. The projects include connecting radio stations in the Central African Republic with listeners and aid groups to report on attacks, using mesh networks in Nigeria to allow human rights workers to share information with a media center, and tracking violence against journalists and land issues in Afghanistan and Ukraine through interactive maps. The document emphasizes lessons learned around keeping technologies simple, investing in local capacity and innovation, ensuring projects still work without technology, and the importance of human interactions and understanding local contexts.
Crisis Mapping and the Middle East: revolutionizing the technologyAnahi Iacucci
Crisis mapping combines information collection, visualization, and analysis on an interactive map. Ushahidi is a crowdsourcing crisis mapping platform used in over 30 countries for applications like monitoring elections and violence. The document discusses case studies using Ushahidi in Egypt and Sudan during protests in 2011. In Egypt, the "Bee Project" mapped reports of electoral violations, while in Sudan the "Jan30 Crowdmap" mapped protests but was shut down after two weeks due to lack of local organization and an oppressive regime. The conclusion emphasizes building local capacity in technology use, data protection, security, and understanding limitations to prevent potential harm.
Big data refers to large, complex datasets that are difficult to process using traditional tools. Internews uses big data and data verification techniques to analyze large amounts of related information and spot trends. Data verification involves falsifying or verifying the context, content, and source of information through methods like crowdsourcing, engagement with sources, and media authentication to establish the truth. The challenge is how to effectively verify crowdsourced information and use big data to provide decision makers with reliable insights.
By the People: The Role of Citizen Journalism in the Information RevolutionAnahi Iacucci
By the People: The Role of Citizen Journalism in the Information Revolution' -- a Center for International Media Assistance panel discussion moderated by Adam Clayton Powell III with Dale Peskin of We Media; Jane Sasseen, author of "The video Revolution"; Egyptian journalism Yehia Ghanem of the International Center for Journalists; and Anahi Ayala Iacucci, the Nairobi-based Innovation Editor for Africa for Internews: Center for Innovation & Learning. Held Tuesday December 11, 2012, at the National Endowment for Democracy in Washington.
Social Media for Public Health during Emergencies Anahi Iacucci
Social media plays an important role in emergencies by facilitating information exchange, but it also presents risks and challenges. When emergencies strike, social media becomes a key tool for actors like government agencies and NGOs to disseminate information to the public and understand evolving needs. However, determining who the trusted sources and influencers are during crises can be difficult with the large volumes of user-generated content on platforms. There is also a lack of coordination between responders using social media, leading to an "organized anarchy" response. Proper use of social media in emergencies requires understanding information ecosystems and who may be missing from exchanges.
Part 2 Deep Dive: Navigating the 2024 Slowdownjeffkluth1
Introduction
The global retail industry has weathered numerous storms, with the financial crisis of 2008 serving as a poignant reminder of the sector's resilience and adaptability. However, as we navigate the complex landscape of 2024, retailers face a unique set of challenges that demand innovative strategies and a fundamental shift in mindset. This white paper contrasts the impact of the 2008 recession on the retail sector with the current headwinds retailers are grappling with, while offering a comprehensive roadmap for success in this new paradigm.
B2B payments are rapidly changing. Find out the 5 key questions you need to be asking yourself to be sure you are mastering B2B payments today. Learn more at www.BlueSnap.com.
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In this webinar, we won't focus on the research methods for discovering user-needs. We will focus on synthesis of the needs we discover, communication and alignment tools, and how we operationalize addressing those needs.
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Storytelling is an incredibly valuable tool to share data and information. To get the most impact from stories there are a number of key ingredients. These are based on science and human nature. Using these elements in a story you can deliver information impactfully, ensure action and drive change.
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4. Even before you begin a forecasting exercise,
a first step is to prepare the mind for the
always uncertain future. A prepared mind is
ready to think the unthinkable. It’s also able to
hold multiple realities without jumping to judg-
ment too early.
Preparing your mind is a readiness exercise,
to probe where you are as a leader—at any
level of your organization. It’s also about
probing where the organization is. Once you
know where you are, it is much easier to
sense where to start in the vast array of future
options that you might consider.
The best sensing is done with an open mind
that resists judgment long enough to figure
out what’s going on—even if what’s going on
doesn’t fit your expectations or honor your
values. Often, the most innovative ideas come
from engaging with what feels most foreign,
from those moments when you have a strange
sense in the pit of your stomach that some-
thing doesn’t fit.
You can always be working to prepare your
mind, especially in tough situations. A key
practice is to resist shutting down or respond-
ing instinctively when what is going on
catches you off guard. The first question to
ask when you arrive early in a new situation
is, “What’s going on here?” If you’re having
strong reactions, ask yourself, “Why am I
reacting this way? Which of my assumptions
are being challenged? Do those assumptions
deserve to be challenged?”
Deep sensing is difficult because we are often
rushing for judgment and are rewarded for
speed in decision making. Sensing requires
a pause, sometimes a long pause. Sensing
requires reflection to get beneath surface
reactions and see what is really going on,
beneath what it looks like is going on or what
others might like you to believe is going on.
Sensing requires the discipline to hold at the
perception stage just long enough, before
moving to judgment. Foresight encourages
you to spend more time sensing, to develop
skills in asking questions that matter and
resisting answers that don’t. The quest is to
avoid answers that are premature, answers
that reflect only your assumptions—and get
to the new insight that might be revealed from
more careful consideration.
Preparing your mind may be the most impor-
tant stage in creating a forecast that is truly
useful.
We develop foresight to sense and
understand the context around the
dilemmas that challenge us. The
goal is not to predict what’s going
to happen but to provoke our col-
lective creativity and prepare for the
biggest challenges, many of which
are likely to come in the form of
dilemmas.
Foresight is the first step in any
good strategy process: the search
for external forces and environ-
mental factors creates the context
for both strategy and innovation.
Leaders are always sensing, as well
as coaching others, about what’s
important and what’s not in this
future context. Foresight is thus the
ability to sense what could hap-
pen before it happens, the ability
to identify innovation opportunities.
The result is a strategic vision of
where you are and where you want
to go, and a pretty good idea how
you are going to get there early.
Vision is your own personal state-
ment, or your organization’s state-
ment, of the particular future that
you intend to create. Vision is the
beginning of strategy.
Even in a world of dilemmas,
decisions need to be made.
But leaders must be tuned to
the emergent realities around
them in order to decide
what to do and when to act.
Connection is key, and leaders
are always connecting: people
to people, ideas to ideas. Many
innovations are simply connec-
tions that are made for the first
time. Leaders need a flexible
learn-as-you-go style—since
most dilemmas keep changing
faces. Strategy leads to deci-
sions and action—in order to
make a difference. Even when
the action begins, it must be
carried out with agility—in
order to respond to the inevi-
table corrections that will be
required. Firm action is need-
ed, with an ability to flex.
Action is aimed at results, at
making a difference. In the
business environment, making
a difference can mean mak-
ing a certain amount of money
within a designated timeframe,
but making money can be
defined in many different ways,
with different processes: out-
comes, return on investment,
implementation, shareholder
value, rollout, change, com-
mercialization, institutionaliza-
tion, or execution. These are
all outcome oriented, but even
outcomes often come about in
stages.
The ultimate basis for evaluat-
ing a forecast is not what you
got right in the forecast but
whether the forecast helped
leaders make better decisions
that led to action that made a
difference.
What to ask: What are
the current pain points
for you and others in your
organization? What pains
keep you and your team
awake at night?
WHY: Although a com-
pelling vision sometimes
prompts major change,
innovative directions are
more commonly prompt-
ed by pain. If you under-
stand the current pains
of your organization, you
can figure out what kinds
of foresight are likely to
be most provocative in
generating pain relief.
What to ask: What is
your intent as a leader?
WHY: If intentions are
understood, then foresight
becomes a context for
your intentions. Foresight
is focused on external
future forces. Intent
always lives in a larger
context, and foresight can
help you understand—and
possibly influence—that
context.
What to ask: What is
the destination for your
organization?
WHY: This will help you
identify the waves of
change that you could
ride to reach that desti-
nation and the waves of
change that could drive
you off course.
What to ask: What is
the biggest business
challenge you are
facing right now? How
might that challenge be
informed or influenced by
external future forces?
WHY: Ultimately, you
will want to link foresight
to your present-day
decisions and actions.
Focusing on real near-
term challenges helps you
interpret the meaning of
future forces for your own
dilemmas. This is where
insight comes from.
What to ask: What’s
going on in the lives of
the participants, outside
your forecasting effort?
How might these outside
influences shape your
efforts?
WHY: Sometimes outside
forces will influence a
forecasting project—
whether it’s a month-long
effort or a day-long meet-
ing. Foresight encourages
people to step outside
their normal routines, but
the day-to-day pressures
of life can still bleed in.
Being aware of these
influences can help you
understand and redirect
the reactions of individu-
als if they stray from the
goals of the exercise.
WHAT’S UNDER-THE-RADAR AND
NON-OBVIOUS?
You aren’t looking for the familiar head-
lines here, but rather things that no one
necessarily expects. Pay special atten-
tion to your own field of expertise, using
your familiar sources, but with an eye to
what might cause unexpected disrup-
tions and or opportunities to move in a
new direction. Then get others, including
outside experts, to do the same—these
multiple expert perspectives will give
you the best ideas.
WHAT MIGHT CAUSE UNEXPECTED
DISRUPTIONS?
You may well have an intuitive sense for
picking out disruptive triggers. But there
are some questions you can ask your-
self to help decide if a signal that you’re
sensing is something that can escalate
to a large-scale threat or opportunity:
• Does it involve a change of scale?
When scales of activity or impact
change, the results are often disruptive
and even revolutionary. Technological
change often enables many people to
do what only a few could do before, for
example.
• Does it involve a redefinition of
existing boundaries?
Boundaries—whether political,
geographical, organizational, or
conceptual—define what’s included
and what’s excluded. Changes in
these boundaries or new ways to cross
existing boundaries almost always
destabilize a situation, opening the
possibility for innovation and change.
• Does it have the potential to spread
virally?
We used to think of biological pathogens
as the main types of viral disruptions,
but it is now clear that economic and
technological innovations can also rap-
idly diffuse virally—that is, by contact.
Consider machine-to-machine and
species-to-species contact as well as
human-to-human or organization-to-
organization contact. “Stickiness” is a
key concept in viral spread. Something
is sticky if it tends to persist in a network
of “carriers.”
• Does it shift world views for a
significant group of people?
Any major paradigm shift carries with it
the potential for disruption and innova-
tion as people adopt (or fail to adopt)
the new paradigm at different speeds.
The key here is understanding the inflec-
tion point: is the new paradigm likely
to spread slowly, gradually changing
the social fabric or is it something that
will have a very sudden onset once it is
recognized? Finally, do those espousing
it hold some special status in society or
constitute a large enough share (some-
times only 20% is required) to have a
major impact on the global landscape?
• Does it point to a strong shift in
identity?
Identity is one of the key markers for
both cooperation and competition. Any
innovation or shift in identity may point
to a reorganization of the way people
and organizations will change the way
things are done.
• Does it challenge existing authority?
Authority may be political, organizational,
religious, or intellectual. Innovations or
activities that challenge any of these
authorities are potentially disruptive and
could even escalate to conflict.
WHAT IS THE SCOPE OF IMPACT,
BOTH GEOGRAPHIC AND TEMPORAL?
The potential for significant change may
be local, regional, or global. Be clear
about the scope of your current chal-
lenges and tune your sensing to the
appropriate scope. But don’t overlook
signals outside your geographic scope
that could ultimately open opportunities
or exacerbate your current dilemma.
Also, tune your foresight to provide a
long enough view to take you beyond
your present frameworks and assump-
tions, but close enough to be action-
able. For most business organizations,
a ten-year horizon is a good target,
although certain very long-term trends
may require unexpected decisions in the
present. For organizations with large-
scale social agendas and for policy set-
ting, a longer horizon—20 or even 50
years—may be more appropriate.
Foresight is derived from listening for, sensing, and characterizing futures that
provoke your own creativity. But as you sense, how do you sort the important from
the merely new and interesting? Here are some questions to guide you in filtering
what you’re sensing.
Leaders are sensemakers: They
help others make sense—often by
asking penetrating questions. It
turns out that foresight is a particu-
larly good way to stimulate insight,
to help make sense out of dilem-
mas and imagine what you might
do next.
Sensemaking is, essentially, a
search for an “a-ha!” that contrib-
utes to your strategy and seeds
innovation. Insight is the core ele-
ment of any good strategy, but
insight is scarce, and it doesn’t just
happen. Insight is most likely to
happen as a result of hard work,
open-mindedness toward future
possibilities, intuition, and a touch
of serendipity.
Foresight is inherently provocative,
but leaders must draw lessons from
the provocation if they are to create
a clear, compelling, and productive
way forward. This is insight, and it
must be communicated clearly so
that not only you understand it but
so also do those whom you need to
engage.
In the end, insight is a necessary
prerequisite for a winning strategy.
Juxtaposition and cross impacts
Sometimes just putting two seemingly
unrelated forecasts side by side can pro-
voke an insight. Simple questions can
guide you: What happens when these
two things intersect? And what does that
mean for us?
You can also juxtapose forecasts to cur-
rent practices and situations. A good
way to do this is to make a two-column
list. The first column is a list of current
practices and assumptions; label this
column “What we’re moving from.” Then
juxtapose elements of the forecast with
each of the practices to see where they
might lead; put these new practices in the
second column and label it “What we’re
moving to.” These kinds of from–to state-
ments are a form of insight.
Finally, you can do this much more sys-
tematically in a cross-impact matrix. Put
your most important current assumptions
and practices on one axis and the most
important forecasts on the other. Then
explore the cells, asking “How might this
forecast change this practice? Each cell is
a potential insight.
Clustering and connecting the dots
Clustering is similar to juxtaposition, but
it involves finding the relationships among
multiple forecast elements. In the process
of trying to cluster, the mind automatically
draws on intuition, and as this intuition
rises to the surface, insights often emerge.
Clustering can be done by one person or
many. With many people, it’s more dif-
ficult because tapping on intuition tends
to draw one’s attention inside; in a group
environment, it’s hard to create space for
this “going inside.” One way to do this
is an exercise we call “silent clustering.”
In this exercise, dozens or maybe even a
hundred forecast elements are placed on
sticky cards and posted randomly on a
wall. Then everyone in the group begins
to move the cards around to cluster
them, all without speaking. Over about a
half hour, stable clusters tend to emerge,
and participants can begin to label them.
Sometimes the labels themselves rep-
resent an insight. Sometimes the insight
emerges from probing how all of the cards
in a cluster are related and what those
relationships mean for your practices—or
for any dilemmas you may be facing.
Scenarios and storytelling
Scenarios and storytelling take cluster-
ing to a more refined level. Instead of just
grouping forecast elements together, they
engage our “what if?” thinking to picture
the combined impacts and possibilities
in a “real-life” situation. Scenarios can
be very simple or very complex, but one
practice that can help in drawing out
insights is creating a little vignette—a
story that is populated with imaginary
people in the future who are coping with
a dilemma.
These peopled stories, like real-word
examples, make the abstract concrete.
Everybody likes examples because they
provide a hook to hang a lot of ideas on.
Sometimes present-day examples are
compelling enough to produce an insight.
But when they’re not—or when the fore-
cast diverges significantly from the future,
examples may not be readily available.
Then vignettes can fill the gap, again
drawing out our own intuitions and linking
them to foresight to produce insight.
Immersion experiences
When you’re immersed in a situation, all
your channels of knowing and sensing are
receiving signals. This complex feed of
environmental information can often reor-
ganize the way you think about the world.
So a very effective way of using foresight
to provoke insight is to find present-day
situations that suggest or point to the
future, and immerse yourself in them.
These immersion experiences can be
short field trips or extended stays. Many
organizations are increasingly interested in
ethnography as a way to get these immer-
sive experiences. Guided by forecasts—
for example, a forecast about the growing
importance of a region—ethnographic vis-
its can provide a multi-dimensional sense-
picture of an unfamiliar landscape that
has elements of the future landscape. This
sense-picture is another form of insight.
Simulations, which come in many
forms, offer another form of immersion.
Simulations create a low-risk environment
where people can learn in a first-person
way. These can range from 3-D virtual
worlds to alternate-reality and role-playing
games. They can be particularly effective
at developing new skills. You can practice
without the pressure of real-world conse-
quences, and this can prepare you to face
real challenges.
Example
Biotechnology at
Procter & Gamble
In 1999, our forecasts suggested
that biotech was becoming
increasingly important and that it
was mixing in very creative ways
with information technologies, as
we can see much more clearly
today. We presented this forecast
to the Global Leadership Council
of Procter & Gamble (P&G). Our
foresight for P&G was that bio-
tech would become increasingly
important for many P&G products.
The top 12 people at P&G looked
around the table and realized that
none of them had the expertise
needed to make good business
decisions with regard to biotech.
This was an insight, an “a-ha!”
moment, for P&G.
The action was to create a
Biotech Reverse Mentoring
Program for the top 12 people
at P&G. We located young Ph.D.
biotech scientists, all of them at
P&G, who were willing to become
reverse mentors for their senior
executive colleagues—meeting
about once a month for one year.
The result was a considerable
increase in the biotech expertise
of the top executives: they did
not become scientists, but they
certainly knew a lot more about
the business implications of this
new area of science. At the end
of the year, P&G had a biotech
strategy, and you can now see the
results of this strategy reflected
in many P&G products, especially
in detergents and hair care prod-
ucts. One of the top executives,
A. G. Lafley, continued to use his
reverse mentor, Len Sauers, as
an informal science adviser even
after he became CEO of Procter &
Gamble.
Example
Campbell’s Soup and Healthy,
Portable, Nutritious Eating
In 2005, Campbell’s Soup execu-
tives looked at the marketplace
for their products and thought ten
years ahead. As part of this pro-
cess, they concluded that healthy,
portable, and nutritious eating will
be an important driver for the food
industry. They also concluded that
Campbell’s should be at the cen-
ter of this space.
The future of food will go to
those providers who do not view
taste and nutritional value as an
either/or choice. Rather, the most
successful foods will be both
tasty and nutritious. In the health
economy, more and more con-
sumers will use health as a filter to
evaluate products and services for
purchase. Food companies must
engage with the dilemma of creat-
ing healthy foods that taste good.
IFTF works with Campbell’s to do
forecasts of external future forces
affecting the concept of portable
nutritious foods like soup. We
also helped Campbell’s organize
a Future State Advisory Board to
advise it on external future forces.
The Campbell’s USA leadership
team developed a destination
statement, thinking ten years
ahead. The focus was on where
they wanted to be as a brand and
as a product line in ten years. The
essence of this destination is the
slogan “Nourishing people’s lives
everywhere, everyday.”
Around this core statement, spe-
cific dimensions of success were
developed, including measures
that could be used to track their
progress. This process was a use-
ful approach to strategic foresight,
where Campbell’s began with a
careful analysis of where they
wanted to be in ten years. From
that destination statement, they
could work backward to figure out
what they needed to do between
now and ten years from now in
order to reach their destination.
5. Even before you begin a forecasting exercise,
a first step is to prepare the mind for the
always uncertain future. A prepared mind is
ready to think the unthinkable. It’s also able to
hold multiple realities without jumping to judg-
ment too early.
Preparing your mind is a readiness exercise,
to probe where you are as a leader—at any
level of your organization. It’s also about
probing where the organization is. Once you
know where you are, it is much easier to
sense where to start in the vast array of future
options that you might consider.
The best sensing is done with an open mind
that resists judgment long enough to figure
out what’s going on—even if what’s going on
doesn’t fit your expectations or honor your
values. Often, the most innovative ideas come
from engaging with what feels most foreign,
from those moments when you have a strange
sense in the pit of your stomach that some-
thing doesn’t fit.
You can always be working to prepare your
mind, especially in tough situations. A key
practice is to resist shutting down or respond-
ing instinctively when what is going on
catches you off guard. The first question to
ask when you arrive early in a new situation
is, “What’s going on here?” If you’re having
strong reactions, ask yourself, “Why am I
reacting this way? Which of my assumptions
are being challenged? Do those assumptions
deserve to be challenged?”
Deep sensing is difficult because we are often
rushing for judgment and are rewarded for
speed in decision making. Sensing requires
a pause, sometimes a long pause. Sensing
requires reflection to get beneath surface
reactions and see what is really going on,
beneath what it looks like is going on or what
others might like you to believe is going on.
Sensing requires the discipline to hold at the
perception stage just long enough, before
moving to judgment. Foresight encourages
you to spend more time sensing, to develop
skills in asking questions that matter and
resisting answers that don’t. The quest is to
avoid answers that are premature, answers
that reflect only your assumptions—and get
to the new insight that might be revealed from
more careful consideration.
Preparing your mind may be the most impor-
tant stage in creating a forecast that is truly
useful.
We develop foresight to sense and
understand the context around the
dilemmas that challenge us. The
goal is not to predict what’s going
to happen but to provoke our col-
lective creativity and prepare for the
biggest challenges, many of which
are likely to come in the form of
dilemmas.
Foresight is the first step in any
good strategy process: the search
for external forces and environ-
mental factors creates the context
for both strategy and innovation.
Leaders are always sensing, as well
as coaching others, about what’s
important and what’s not in this
future context. Foresight is thus the
ability to sense what could hap-
pen before it happens, the ability
to identify innovation opportunities.
The result is a strategic vision of
where you are and where you want
to go, and a pretty good idea how
you are going to get there early.
Vision is your own personal state-
ment, or your organization’s state-
ment, of the particular future that
you intend to create. Vision is the
beginning of strategy.
Even in a world of dilemmas,
decisions need to be made.
But leaders must be tuned to
the emergent realities around
them in order to decide
what to do and when to act.
Connection is key, and leaders
are always connecting: people
to people, ideas to ideas. Many
innovations are simply connec-
tions that are made for the first
time. Leaders need a flexible
learn-as-you-go style—since
most dilemmas keep changing
faces. Strategy leads to deci-
sions and action—in order to
make a difference. Even when
the action begins, it must be
carried out with agility—in
order to respond to the inevi-
table corrections that will be
required. Firm action is need-
ed, with an ability to flex.
Action is aimed at results, at
making a difference. In the
business environment, making
a difference can mean mak-
ing a certain amount of money
within a designated timeframe,
but making money can be
defined in many different ways,
with different processes: out-
comes, return on investment,
implementation, shareholder
value, rollout, change, com-
mercialization, institutionaliza-
tion, or execution. These are
all outcome oriented, but even
outcomes often come about in
stages.
The ultimate basis for evaluat-
ing a forecast is not what you
got right in the forecast but
whether the forecast helped
leaders make better decisions
that led to action that made a
difference.
What to ask: What are
the current pain points
for you and others in your
organization? What pains
keep you and your team
awake at night?
WHY: Although a com-
pelling vision sometimes
prompts major change,
innovative directions are
more commonly prompt-
ed by pain. If you under-
stand the current pains
of your organization, you
can figure out what kinds
of foresight are likely to
be most provocative in
generating pain relief.
What to ask: What is
your intent as a leader?
WHY: If intentions are
understood, then foresight
becomes a context for
your intentions. Foresight
is focused on external
future forces. Intent
always lives in a larger
context, and foresight can
help you understand—and
possibly influence—that
context.
What to ask: What is
the destination for your
organization?
WHY: This will help you
identify the waves of
change that you could
ride to reach that desti-
nation and the waves of
change that could drive
you off course.
What to ask: What is
the biggest business
challenge you are
facing right now? How
might that challenge be
informed or influenced by
external future forces?
WHY: Ultimately, you
will want to link foresight
to your present-day
decisions and actions.
Focusing on real near-
term challenges helps you
interpret the meaning of
future forces for your own
dilemmas. This is where
insight comes from.
What to ask: What’s
going on in the lives of
the participants, outside
your forecasting effort?
How might these outside
influences shape your
efforts?
WHY: Sometimes outside
forces will influence a
forecasting project—
whether it’s a month-long
effort or a day-long meet-
ing. Foresight encourages
people to step outside
their normal routines, but
the day-to-day pressures
of life can still bleed in.
Being aware of these
influences can help you
understand and redirect
the reactions of individu-
als if they stray from the
goals of the exercise.
WHAT’S UNDER-THE-RADAR AND
NON-OBVIOUS?
You aren’t looking for the familiar head-
lines here, but rather things that no one
necessarily expects. Pay special atten-
tion to your own field of expertise, using
your familiar sources, but with an eye to
what might cause unexpected disrup-
tions and or opportunities to move in a
new direction. Then get others, including
outside experts, to do the same—these
multiple expert perspectives will give
you the best ideas.
WHAT MIGHT CAUSE UNEXPECTED
DISRUPTIONS?
You may well have an intuitive sense for
picking out disruptive triggers. But there
are some questions you can ask your-
self to help decide if a signal that you’re
sensing is something that can escalate
to a large-scale threat or opportunity:
• Does it involve a change of scale?
When scales of activity or impact
change, the results are often disruptive
and even revolutionary. Technological
change often enables many people to
do what only a few could do before, for
example.
• Does it involve a redefinition of
existing boundaries?
Boundaries—whether political,
geographical, organizational, or
conceptual—define what’s included
and what’s excluded. Changes in
these boundaries or new ways to cross
existing boundaries almost always
destabilize a situation, opening the
possibility for innovation and change.
• Does it have the potential to spread
virally?
We used to think of biological pathogens
as the main types of viral disruptions,
but it is now clear that economic and
technological innovations can also rap-
idly diffuse virally—that is, by contact.
Consider machine-to-machine and
species-to-species contact as well as
human-to-human or organization-to-
organization contact. “Stickiness” is a
key concept in viral spread. Something
is sticky if it tends to persist in a network
of “carriers.”
• Does it shift world views for a
significant group of people?
Any major paradigm shift carries with it
the potential for disruption and innova-
tion as people adopt (or fail to adopt)
the new paradigm at different speeds.
The key here is understanding the inflec-
tion point: is the new paradigm likely
to spread slowly, gradually changing
the social fabric or is it something that
will have a very sudden onset once it is
recognized? Finally, do those espousing
it hold some special status in society or
constitute a large enough share (some-
times only 20% is required) to have a
major impact on the global landscape?
• Does it point to a strong shift in
identity?
Identity is one of the key markers for
both cooperation and competition. Any
innovation or shift in identity may point
to a reorganization of the way people
and organizations will change the way
things are done.
• Does it challenge existing authority?
Authority may be political, organizational,
religious, or intellectual. Innovations or
activities that challenge any of these
authorities are potentially disruptive and
could even escalate to conflict.
WHAT IS THE SCOPE OF IMPACT,
BOTH GEOGRAPHIC AND TEMPORAL?
The potential for significant change may
be local, regional, or global. Be clear
about the scope of your current chal-
lenges and tune your sensing to the
appropriate scope. But don’t overlook
signals outside your geographic scope
that could ultimately open opportunities
or exacerbate your current dilemma.
Also, tune your foresight to provide a
long enough view to take you beyond
your present frameworks and assump-
tions, but close enough to be action-
able. For most business organizations,
a ten-year horizon is a good target,
although certain very long-term trends
may require unexpected decisions in the
present. For organizations with large-
scale social agendas and for policy set-
ting, a longer horizon—20 or even 50
years—may be more appropriate.
Foresight is derived from listening for, sensing, and characterizing futures that
provoke your own creativity. But as you sense, how do you sort the important from
the merely new and interesting? Here are some questions to guide you in filtering
what you’re sensing.
Leaders are sensemakers: They
help others make sense—often by
asking penetrating questions. It
turns out that foresight is a particu-
larly good way to stimulate insight,
to help make sense out of dilem-
mas and imagine what you might
do next.
Sensemaking is, essentially, a
search for an “a-ha!” that contrib-
utes to your strategy and seeds
innovation. Insight is the core ele-
ment of any good strategy, but
insight is scarce, and it doesn’t just
happen. Insight is most likely to
happen as a result of hard work,
open-mindedness toward future
possibilities, intuition, and a touch
of serendipity.
Foresight is inherently provocative,
but leaders must draw lessons from
the provocation if they are to create
a clear, compelling, and productive
way forward. This is insight, and it
must be communicated clearly so
that not only you understand it but
so also do those whom you need to
engage.
In the end, insight is a necessary
prerequisite for a winning strategy.
Juxtaposition and cross impacts
Sometimes just putting two seemingly
unrelated forecasts side by side can pro-
voke an insight. Simple questions can
guide you: What happens when these
two things intersect? And what does that
mean for us?
You can also juxtapose forecasts to cur-
rent practices and situations. A good
way to do this is to make a two-column
list. The first column is a list of current
practices and assumptions; label this
column “What we’re moving from.” Then
juxtapose elements of the forecast with
each of the practices to see where they
might lead; put these new practices in the
second column and label it “What we’re
moving to.” These kinds of from–to state-
ments are a form of insight.
Finally, you can do this much more sys-
tematically in a cross-impact matrix. Put
your most important current assumptions
and practices on one axis and the most
important forecasts on the other. Then
explore the cells, asking “How might this
forecast change this practice? Each cell is
a potential insight.
Clustering and connecting the dots
Clustering is similar to juxtaposition, but
it involves finding the relationships among
multiple forecast elements. In the process
of trying to cluster, the mind automatically
draws on intuition, and as this intuition
rises to the surface, insights often emerge.
Clustering can be done by one person or
many. With many people, it’s more dif-
ficult because tapping on intuition tends
to draw one’s attention inside; in a group
environment, it’s hard to create space for
this “going inside.” One way to do this
is an exercise we call “silent clustering.”
In this exercise, dozens or maybe even a
hundred forecast elements are placed on
sticky cards and posted randomly on a
wall. Then everyone in the group begins
to move the cards around to cluster
them, all without speaking. Over about a
half hour, stable clusters tend to emerge,
and participants can begin to label them.
Sometimes the labels themselves rep-
resent an insight. Sometimes the insight
emerges from probing how all of the cards
in a cluster are related and what those
relationships mean for your practices—or
for any dilemmas you may be facing.
Scenarios and storytelling
Scenarios and storytelling take cluster-
ing to a more refined level. Instead of just
grouping forecast elements together, they
engage our “what if?” thinking to picture
the combined impacts and possibilities
in a “real-life” situation. Scenarios can
be very simple or very complex, but one
practice that can help in drawing out
insights is creating a little vignette—a
story that is populated with imaginary
people in the future who are coping with
a dilemma.
These peopled stories, like real-word
examples, make the abstract concrete.
Everybody likes examples because they
provide a hook to hang a lot of ideas on.
Sometimes present-day examples are
compelling enough to produce an insight.
But when they’re not—or when the fore-
cast diverges significantly from the future,
examples may not be readily available.
Then vignettes can fill the gap, again
drawing out our own intuitions and linking
them to foresight to produce insight.
Immersion experiences
When you’re immersed in a situation, all
your channels of knowing and sensing are
receiving signals. This complex feed of
environmental information can often reor-
ganize the way you think about the world.
So a very effective way of using foresight
to provoke insight is to find present-day
situations that suggest or point to the
future, and immerse yourself in them.
These immersion experiences can be
short field trips or extended stays. Many
organizations are increasingly interested in
ethnography as a way to get these immer-
sive experiences. Guided by forecasts—
for example, a forecast about the growing
importance of a region—ethnographic vis-
its can provide a multi-dimensional sense-
picture of an unfamiliar landscape that
has elements of the future landscape. This
sense-picture is another form of insight.
Simulations, which come in many
forms, offer another form of immersion.
Simulations create a low-risk environment
where people can learn in a first-person
way. These can range from 3-D virtual
worlds to alternate-reality and role-playing
games. They can be particularly effective
at developing new skills. You can practice
without the pressure of real-world conse-
quences, and this can prepare you to face
real challenges.
Example
Biotechnology at
Procter & Gamble
In 1999, our forecasts suggested
that biotech was becoming
increasingly important and that it
was mixing in very creative ways
with information technologies, as
we can see much more clearly
today. We presented this forecast
to the Global Leadership Council
of Procter & Gamble (P&G). Our
foresight for P&G was that bio-
tech would become increasingly
important for many P&G products.
The top 12 people at P&G looked
around the table and realized that
none of them had the expertise
needed to make good business
decisions with regard to biotech.
This was an insight, an “a-ha!”
moment, for P&G.
The action was to create a
Biotech Reverse Mentoring
Program for the top 12 people
at P&G. We located young Ph.D.
biotech scientists, all of them at
P&G, who were willing to become
reverse mentors for their senior
executive colleagues—meeting
about once a month for one year.
The result was a considerable
increase in the biotech expertise
of the top executives: they did
not become scientists, but they
certainly knew a lot more about
the business implications of this
new area of science. At the end
of the year, P&G had a biotech
strategy, and you can now see the
results of this strategy reflected
in many P&G products, especially
in detergents and hair care prod-
ucts. One of the top executives,
A. G. Lafley, continued to use his
reverse mentor, Len Sauers, as
an informal science adviser even
after he became CEO of Procter &
Gamble.
Example
Campbell’s Soup and Healthy,
Portable, Nutritious Eating
In 2005, Campbell’s Soup execu-
tives looked at the marketplace
for their products and thought ten
years ahead. As part of this pro-
cess, they concluded that healthy,
portable, and nutritious eating will
be an important driver for the food
industry. They also concluded that
Campbell’s should be at the cen-
ter of this space.
The future of food will go to
those providers who do not view
taste and nutritional value as an
either/or choice. Rather, the most
successful foods will be both
tasty and nutritious. In the health
economy, more and more con-
sumers will use health as a filter to
evaluate products and services for
purchase. Food companies must
engage with the dilemma of creat-
ing healthy foods that taste good.
IFTF works with Campbell’s to do
forecasts of external future forces
affecting the concept of portable
nutritious foods like soup. We
also helped Campbell’s organize
a Future State Advisory Board to
advise it on external future forces.
The Campbell’s USA leadership
team developed a destination
statement, thinking ten years
ahead. The focus was on where
they wanted to be as a brand and
as a product line in ten years. The
essence of this destination is the
slogan “Nourishing people’s lives
everywhere, everyday.”
Around this core statement, spe-
cific dimensions of success were
developed, including measures
that could be used to track their
progress. This process was a use-
ful approach to strategic foresight,
where Campbell’s began with a
careful analysis of where they
wanted to be in ten years. From
that destination statement, they
could work backward to figure out
what they needed to do between
now and ten years from now in
order to reach their destination.