FUTURISM: THE FUTURE OF WORK

What is futurism? Glad you asked: By definition, it describes our ability to predict future events and trends, and project our thoughts forward to determine what’s coming next. More to the point, it’s quickly becoming a crucial job skill to exercise. For example: Have you had the chance to look at recent editions of PWC’s CEO Survey? If you did, you’d see the big theme coming into 2020, 2021 and beyond (even before the COVID-19 recession and coronavirus pandemic) was uncertainty.

According to global business leaders:

Uncertainty is the only certain. Business leaders’ confidence in their enterprises’ ability to achieve both short- and medium-term growth is at an all-time record low.

Great talent is hard to come by. There’s a huge shortage of workers who possess the skills needed to translate the mountain of data we’re all gathering these days into actionable business results.

Moreover, despite investing BILLIONS in digital upskilling, executives are still struggling to get the key info that they need to make intelligent choices – in fact, they say their ability to gain these insights hasn’t improved in a decade.

At the same time, just a few new exponential advancements we’re being forced to adapt to lately as well include:

– 5G Connectivity

– Artificial Intelligence + Robotics

– Blockchain Technologies

– AR and VR Solutions

– Machine Learning + Automation

Not to mention Big Data and The Internet of Things (IoT) as well of course. All of which means that suddenly it’s imperative that organizations be more proactive about thinking several steps ahead of the curve. And, for that matter, promoting meritocracies when it comes to decision making, and championing cultures of learning and growth, since succeeding is now less about our talents as individual professionals, and more about empowering our collective workforces to make change happen.

In essence, it’s important to enable every individual on your team to be able to think like a futurist, and exercise the skill of futurism. After all, your business’ future may depend on it.