State of the Future 19 | Hinesight....for Foresight

Jerry Glenn asked me to alert the APF that the Millennium Project’s new State of the Future report is out. I confess that sometimes I forget to take advantage of what is really a terrific resource. So I thought it might be nice to focus on this for this week’s blog post! It’s the 19^th edition (wow!).

I bet that many of you get the question of “how are we/the future doing?” This report can help us frame that response in a way that is likely to appeal to clients – “here’s what the data says,” and then we can add in our color commentary.

For those not familiar with it, the State of the Future has been tracking 15 Global Challenges since its inception, captured in a State of the Future Index with 28 variables. Generally speaking, we’ve been doing well in some and not -so-well in others, but overall the trend line is positive – albeit that the negatives are pretty serious. This year’s report notes that “The rate of global improvement in SOFI for the coming decade will be 1.14%, versus 3.14% for the period 1990 to 2017.” I think we all feel that things are in a bit of turmoil, but the index points out that there is still some positive movement. I think it is important that we present a balanced picture of the future, and we certainly should not sugar-coat some of the really serious challenges.

A nice bonus of this year’s report is that it includes the results from a “Future Work/Technology 2050 Global Scenarios” project in Chapter 4. It shows how different outcomes might evolve from these trends, along with 100 suggestions to address these issues from The Millennium Project national workshops held in 17 countries in 2016 and 2017. This gets back to a discussion we had on the list for a while on the future of capitalism (which has since migrated to Podio).

Here’s the link: State of the Future 19.0 http://107.22.164.43/millennium/2017SOF.html

Thanks to Jerry and the army of volunteers for producing this valuable report!

andy

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About Andy Hines

Dr. Andy Hines is Program Coordinator at the University of Houston’s Graduate Program in Foresight, bringing together the experience he earned as an organizational, consulting, and academic futurist. He is also speaking, workshopping, and consulting through his firm Hinesight.

Before that, he was Managing Director of Social Technologies/Innovaro, and served as an Adjunct Professor with the university since 2004. Hines enjoyed earlier careers as a consulting and organizational futurist. He was a partner with Coates & Jarratt, Inc., a think tank and consulting firm that specialized in the study of the future. He was also Futurist & Senior Ideation Leader at Dow Chemical with a mission of using futures tools and knowledge to turn ideas into new business opportunities. Before that, Hines established and ran the Global Trends Program for the Kellogg Company.

Hines is motivated by a professional hunger to make foresight practical and useful, and he believes that foresight can help deliver the insight that is so needed in today’s organizations and the world. His goal, he says, is to infect as many change agents as possible with this message. Thus, he has honed a skill set designed to make foresight more actionable in organizations.

In this pursuit, he has authored five books: Teaching about the Future: The Basics of Foresight Education (Palgrave Macmillan, 2012); ConsumerShift: How Changing Values Are Reshaping the Consumer Landscape (No Limits Publishing, 2011); Thinking About the Future: Guidelines for Strategic Foresight (Social Technologies, 2007); 2025: Science and Technology Reshapes US and Global Society (Oak Hill, 1997); and Managing Your Future as an Association (ASAE, 1994) and has another in the hands of publishers: Teaching about the Future: The Basics of Foresight Education. He has also authored dozens of articles, speeches, and workshops, including the 2003 Emerald Literati Awards’ Outstanding Paper accolade for best article published in Foresight for “An Audit for Organizational Futurists” and the 2008 award for “Scenarios: The State of the Art.” He has appeared on several radio and television programs, PBS Houston, KRIV-26 News, and the CBS “Early Show.” He also co-founded and is former Chair of the Association of Professional Futurists.

About Andy Hines

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