The role of the futurist as leader

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When I was in Amsterdam recently for client engagements I also gave a keynote to the Dutch Future Society about the role of the futurist.

It was a fascinating evening. Given the audience of futurists and those well engaged with the future, my presentation went further out than usual, and the ensuing conversation went beyond that, to issues including the nature of humanity, the ethics of the future, and more.

In coming months I intend to share some of the many fascinating strands that came up during the evening.

After the event I was interviewed by Stephan Verveen. The interview, embedded below, covers quite a few of the points raised during the evening.


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As more jobs are automated, how many of us will still have productive work?

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There has been a lot of press the last few days about a paper The Future of Employment: How Susceptible Are Jobs to Computerisation?, published by the Oxford Martin Programme on the Impacts of Future Technology.

Almost all the coverage has been on the headline figure that 47% of US employment is at risk. However the paper provides many more interesting insights when you examine the detail.
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The crime of the century: stopping the potential of connectivity

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Last week I gave the keynotes at the Sydney and Melbourne relaunch events of Nextgen Group, which has restructured and rebranded with the acquisition of 70% of the group by Ontario Teachers Pension Plan (OTPP) from Leighton Holdings. The group provides networks, data centers, and hosting services, including a 100Gbps link between major Australian cities, and is building a submarine fibre cable linking Australia to Singapore.

The theme of my keynote was The Future of a Connected World, showcasing some of most interesting implications and potential of connectivity.

To provide some context for the future I spent a moment looking at the past of connectivity, which unfortunately is not always as happy a story as the future.
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Amsterdam visit September 18-20: keynotes at Dutch Future Society and on the future of investment management

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I am looking forward to getting back to Amsterdam this September 18-20, after doing the keynote at TheNextWeb last year.

I will be giving a keynote on The Future of Investment Management and run an executive workshop on Creating the Successful Organisation of the Future at the closed-door SimCorp International User Community Meeting.

I will also be giving a keynote at the Dutch Future Society, described here:

The Dutch Future Society is proud to present a session with Ross Dawson. Ross will give a keynote presentation on what he believes is the role of the futurist; why he combines the roles of futurist and entrepreneur; some of the central trends he follow on the future of work, crowdsourcing, infinite information, creativity and experimentation; how he uses visual and now frameworks for futures communication; and how he has built his global business as a futurist.


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How soaring expectations of beauty are shaping technology and society

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I recently travelled to Provence in the hills above Nice to give the keynote at the annual EuroCIO conference.

I used my framework for the future of the CIO to point to the macro drivers of change in technology and society, and how these are shaping the technology function in organizations, and in turn the role of the CIO.

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The single most important shift in society is that we expect more on just about every front that we can imagine. We expect more in everything around us, in terms of excellence in quality and service, opportunity for ourselves and our children, flexibility in our work, and openness and transparency from business and government.

We also expect beauty.
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How technologies will expand and replace human work

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The Australian Financial Review is today running a special feature on the world to 2100, including an article on technology trends titled Connecting to a rising tide of data.

The article covers a number of themes, including the expansion of connectivity, data, and devices, and the impact of technology on healthcare, drawing on interviews with a wide range of experts including Australian of the Year Dr Fiona Wood.

It begins by quoting me on the impact of technology on the world of work.
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We are on track for 518% global economic growth this half-century

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Yesterday I gave an executive briefing to a senior team tasked with generating major new revenue opportunities for their organization.

My presentation delved into the drivers of change in economic structure, individual and societal behaviours, the shape of cities, the role of government, and the implications for the elderly of demographic change.

However to kick off I wanted to put the group into a bigger mental frame than they would usually think in, so I ran through the following chart:

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The future of travel and tourism: safe adventures, real-time guidance, and new frontiers

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Last week, as part of the ongoing weekly future series on the Morning Show, I spoke about the future of travel and tourism.

Click on the image below to watch a video of the segment.

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Some of the things I talked about:
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The future of analogue people in a digital world

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I recently gave the keynote at Bridge Point Forum on Future Directions in the Digital Age, the title riffing off the conference’s theme of The Rise of the Digital Age.

I opened by making the critical point that, while the digital world is rising around us at an extraordinary pace, humans are completely analogue. Nothing about humans is digital. While we can conceive of and enact digital processes and thoughts, these are created from fully analogue neural networks.

This means that one of the most important frames on our future is understanding the interface between analogue humans and our increasingly digital external environment.

I illustrated the idea with segments of this movie of three Geminoids – essentially robot replicas of humans – together with their human models.


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Critical issue: Will the fertility rate in the developed world continue to increase?

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I recently appeared on the Morning Show being interviewed about the future of the family. Click on the image below to see a video of the segment.

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One of the interesting topics we discussed was trends in the fertility rate.
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