Continuing on the next economy theme this week with The Birth of Plenty: How the Prosperity of the Modern World was …
Development ≠ progress
We teach Progress and Development as separate theories in our Social Change class. I sometimes joke that Development is …
Foresight classics: 20/20 foresight characterizes uncertainty
Not surprisingly, we discussed uncertainty during Futures Research class this semester. Hugh Courtney’s 20/20 Foresight: …
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Luck, practice, and the futurist
Success in the future is directly related informed preparation and hard work, right? And the futurists who succeed got …
Designing Foresight and Foresighting Design
I’m happy to share that my collaboration with [former] design student (and now Dr.) Danilo Zindato exploring the uses of …
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Translation and Transformation
I previously wrote [rather briefly] about letting go, translating, and transforming as three major roles of futurists. …
Jobbing or Doing?
A frequently asked question I get as an educator is “can I get a job as a futurist? I tackled this important and …
MISC: Prepping for the Next Economy(s)
I am pleased with the Houston Foresight program's collaboration with the elegant and informative MISC: A …
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Public sector interest in foresight taking off?
I’m in Dubai for a week doing scenarios with a government agency. One can’t help but be impressed by the tremendous …
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Next Economy Additions: Commons, Creative Molecular, and Em/Singularity
A couple of years, I started collecting and posting concepts or names for the next economy as part of my scanning (which …
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Using scenarios
I had the opportunity to share some thoughts on my experience using scenarios for the 7th Session of the International …
Supporting Innovation: Freedom Rules and Money
[You might visit Warren Zevon’s Lawyer’s, Guns, and Money to get in the mood here.….] A lot of foresight work is …
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Intuition in Futures Work
We come to the week in Alternative Perspectives class where we see how far one’s embrace of alternative extends. We call …
A Foresight Competency Model
It was great to be able to brief the new Foresight Competency Model at the recent APF Global Futures Festival. To listen …
Registration open for 2017 UH Foresight Certificate
I am pleased to announce that registration for the 2017 UH Foresight Certificate is now open. The five-day course …
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Foresight in the university world: size matters
Last week we tackled the pressure to bring in research dollars. This week we confront a classic chicken-and-egg problem …
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Foresight in the university world: Research
I'm thinking of a series of unofficial random musings about the state of foresight in the university world, as I begin …
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Future of income inequality via Picketty
Every now and then, perhaps more than I care to admit, I defer reading a book that attains some degree of popular …
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2016 APF Most Significant Futures Works Winners
One of my favorite things to do each year is to coordinate the APF’s Most Significant Futures Works program. Each year, …
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What is successful foresight?
I explored this question as part of my dissertation research a few years back from the perspective of the organizational …
Trends in Foresight Methods
I came across a very nice paper posted to the APF list: Emerging Practices in Foresight and Their Use in STI Policy, by …
Your ideal keynote….
…to new audiences to get them interested in using futurists and foresight If we think about the market for futurists, …
Indicator: “Mainstream” economist embracing uncertainty
Okay, I’m sure there are economists out there embracing or at least acknowledging uncertainty about the future. But a …
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Artificial Intelligence: It Depends
Futurists pretty regularly get asked about artificial intelligence, often along with robots, and perhaps some …
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Graphic of Houston Foresight Scanning Process
Our design expert on the Houston Foresight team, student Maria Romero, is at it again. After doing a beautiful job with …
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Help Disseminate Foresight Market Survey
Most of you know that the market for foresight is still pretty murky. As part of my work on the APF …
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Indicator Alert: The Swiss Say No to Basic Income
We have been keeping an eye on new economy concepts. The passage of a guaranteed basic income would be an indicator of …
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Foresight Classics: Earth Might Be Fair
My journey into classic views of the future recently turned up an expected gem – unexpected in the sense of my not being …
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Is better better?
What’s on my mind here is the potential perniciousness of ubiquitous feedback/performance rankings/predictive …
Historians & Futurists: More Alike than Not
A few weeks ago, we explored a few thoughts around the history of the foresight field. APF colleague Ruben Nelson …
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