FUTURES BAROMETER

FUTURES BAROMETER- 10 QUESTIONS TO ASK OF THE FUTURE

By Claire A. Nelson

PLEASE RANK THEM AS FOLLOWS:

Not Useful; 1-Nominally useful; 2- Definitely Useful; 3; Very Useful

1. Will the technological revolution boost welfare or increase inequality? 2- How will the internet be used after we conquer big data? 3- Will world population growth slow because of the pandemic? 4- Is democracy at risk due to the height of populism? 6- To what extent will business travel resume in this decade? 7- How will political activism work in digital contexts? 8- Can we have a world without war or a cyberwar? 9- What will the international economic order be like as a result of the COVID Pandemic? 10- Will the hybrid workplace improve or worsen employment and work conditions?

EXTRA POINT 11- is there a real timeframe for the end of poverty?

Speak back to the Editors: We would love to hear from you what these questions meant to you? Or to hear your suggestions about a question that makes sense for you. Please visit us at https://bit.ly/FuturesBarometer3-21

TODAY’S complexity and uncertainty demands a flexible, adaptive and focused strategy to guide the resources and plans of action. To be future-ready leaders and organizations must look ahead and develop a strategy. The future comes in stages: next month, next year or ten years from now. The key is decide what to look at and where to look to. Shood we look at the future of what is influencing customers, the market, technology and the competition? What are the trends driving change and pulling the future that we need to know about and watch? Figuring out what are the right questions may be the most important task and might make the difference between devolution and evolution of your plan or your organization. The disruption caused by the COVID Pandemic has led ahead-ofthe-curve leaders to rethink the questions we should be asking about the future. Identifying the right questions is a skill that is often elusive, and indeed, asking the right questions is the hard part. The question you ask ‘frames’ your view and your exploration. Here are ten I have derived from various experts to get you started thinking about questions to ask about the future. Perhaps they might provide some strength-conditioning in the art of the question.

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