How to be a Futurist

We are all curious about the future but we get it wrong. The “experts” get it wrong all the time. You just have to switch on the television before any election (in any country) and you will be treated to a set of pundits holding forth.

Politicians are not futurists

The politicians are the worst when it comes to predicting the future. They may have spoken to their family members and the taxi driver on the way to the studio. My professor used to often say, “The poorer the knowledge, the stronger the opinion.”

Businesses are slower to adapt

Look at the things that we take for granted today. The mobile phone has driven such far reaching changes. In this hyperconnected world, new jobs have sprung up (eg app developer) and some physical products have diminished in importance or disappeared. Every phone has a built in flashlight, a compass, a diary and the best part is that it is all free.

Can families teach organizations?

Families that are dispersed all over the world stay connected over WhatsApp. Organizations still do not acknowledge WhatsApp as a legitimate way to communicate, families do. From the grandparent to grandchild generations are communicating in real time. Even inside businesses WhatsApp groups are formed between team members. Refusal to engage in the College WhatsApp group or quitting the office WhatsApp group is taken as seriously as quitting the organization or maybe like not showing up for the team picnic.

Oversimplification is the culprit

We overestimate the short term impact of technology but underestimate its long term impact. To make sense of events we create simple thumb rules or heuristics that enable us to get by. The real world is much more complex with many different factors playing simultaneously. We are biased and limited by what comes to mind when we think of the future. What we see in front of us takes up much larger mind-space than the unknown that lurks around the bend.

But many people get it right

If you have read science fiction, then you know that a lot of things that technology is capable of doing eg flying cars, is already happening. Science fiction writers have got so many things right about the future. Film makers have spoken of imaginary settings that have already started happening. When the movie Her (2014) spoke about the protagonist falling in love with an operating system, we rolled our eyes and thought of this idea as preposterous. Look at the robots that were showcased this year at Consumer Electronics Show last week and you will realize that the script writer was not very wrong.

Creative people get it right

George Orwell wrote about the all-knowing state where citizens were under constant surveillance by the Big Brother. It is the reality in many countries. As cameras come up everywhere, as you enter offices, gated communities, airports and malls, your face becomes part of hundreds of databased every day. I am sure some day in the near future you will get all your information to show up as you walk through the airport and across borders and electronic fences will keep intruders away thanks to facial-recognition.

Lessons from Futurists

How do futurists manage to see what we cannot? Here are a few ideas where you can help create scenarios like a futurist:

1. Read widely

2. Speak to expert

3. Frequently try to play "WHAT IF..."

4. Challenge your assumptions

5. Combine different industries and then create scenarios

Futurists are experts in systems thinking. They look at socio-economic-political shifts and combine it with technology to create possible scenarios. With practice each one of us can get better at predicting how things may affect us. Thinking and information processing, such as market judgment, can be much faster, more reliable, and ---less subject to political forces than the deliberations of experts or expert committees. Give it a try.

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Ross Dawson tells us how to build a career as a futurist <Click this>