“The courage to be vulnerable is not about winning or losing, it’s about the courage to show up when you can’t predict or control the outcome.”

- Dr. Brené Brown

The word trust gets a lot of airtime. All it takes is a quick flip through your favorite news source or social media feed for a hefty dose of reasons why we question our trust in the media, each other, our government, and business. In its recent report Trust and Distrust in America, the Pew Research Center confirms we’re experiencing a crisis in facts and truth. It’s a highly detailed study but makes a central point that this sad state of affairs is tied to the distrust we have in our institutions.

Based on current data, we know our lives will be different in 2040. To prepare for the opportunities and challenges of the near future, we must address the skills, technologies, and structures we will need to thrive in a changed professional climate. We view the future through the lenses of Privacy, Artificial Intelligence, Education & Learning, Digital Living, Life Expectancy, and Income Inequality. The infographic below explains the potential implications to our future professional lives. What are you doing to prepare?

In May, Toffler Associates hosted an event called Pinot and Ponder, which brought together 75 people to imagine what professional life and the nature of the workforce will be in 2040. The broad consensus was that by that point, machines will have taken over a significant number of the tasks currently performed by humans because. Last week, a colleague and I had the distinct pleasure of presenting the results of this discussion before the joint meeting of the Federal Foresight Community of Interest, the Public Sector Foresight Network, and the Association for Professional Futurists. The theme of this session centered on the disparate rates of progress between human and machine learning, and how education and government can most effectively create parity over the coming decades.

Nobody knows the future with certainty. We can, however, identify ongoing patterns of change.

- Alvin Toffler

Next year marks the 50^th year anniversary of Future Shock. The upcoming milestone presented the opportunity to recently open my well-worn copy to revisit the epochal writing. As the anniversary of this bestseller draws nearer, we will have more opportunities to discuss the impact of the Toffler’s work. One important idea presented towards the end of the book seems very fitting to discuss now, however, especially given our fast approach to the 2020 election season.

Our modern entertainment and pop culture have taken a distinctly, alarmingly dystopian spin. When is the last time you saw the future depicted as a terrific time and place, filled with people thriving thanks to creative solutions to today’s intractable problems? It’s much more likely that you see a trend or concern of today taken to its dreadful conclusion. Take, for example, shows like The Handmaid’s Tale or movies like A Quiet Place. The list goes on with stories of people and communities raging against their context. 

The United States has long maintained a causal relationship between industrial capability and national security. As our domestic manufacturing capabilities continue to erode and fall behind those in other global superpowers, the outcomes are predictable. In a recent series of war simulations, research organization RAND pit the U.S. against China and Russia. The results were startling. We lose quickly and badly.[1]

In a crowded conference hall of human resource professionals, the first address of the North Carolina Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM) annual conference was high energy, comical at times, and clear in message. The human resource executive needs to “up his or her game” to meet the most demanding challenge today’s organizations are facing – the demand for human talent.

Revitalizing workforce agility is urgent; it is a priority that must be satisfied if business leaders are to achieve transformation or modernization goals amidst an ever-changing landscape.

The future of work and workforce agility is uncertain, but not unknowable. Preparing for the future starts with understanding what is creating it. We have identified five drivers shaping the future of organizations and individuals.

Smart city technologies include the internet of Things (IoT), hyper-connected citizens, and data-driven public solutions among other things. These innovations are indeed disruptive individually, but in aggregate promise incredible opportunity for our metro areas. They also have the potential to create major hurdles for those tasked with putting these new resources to work. How do you transform an uncertain future into a platform for competitive advantage?

Click on the infographic below to view it in a separate window.