July 19, 2016

Seeing into the future – TomorrowToday

I love to read. Novels, business books, newspapers, blogs, newsletter – anything interesting and well written is worth the investment in time. I also love trend-spotting, trying to see into the future and predict which way the world is going.

One of the greatest resources for “seeing into the future” is TomorrowToday, which is run by our good CN&CO friend Graeme Codrington. He and his team put out a weekly newsletter called Tips on Tuesdays, which I always enjoy seeing in my inbox. I found today’s edition particularly interesting as it provides a list of sources for tracking future trends.

You can subscribe to TomorrowToday’s Tips on Tuesdays here – but might be too late to catch today’s edition. So here it is, in case you miss it:

The Problem: I know I need to look at the future, but where should I go for my information?

Before we answer the question, let’s be clear about why we need to do this. Everyone needs to be future-focused these days – we cannot leave this to a small team in our organisations.

You may be old enough to remember the workplace of the 1980s, when factories had quality control departments and companies thought health and safety was for other people. In order to ensure we achieved better quality products and safer workplaces we had to make sure that quality and health and safety were everyone’s issue. That’s accepted as normal today. The same is now true of horizon scanning, future thinking and trend watching.

Today the workplace has changed: we live in turbulent times of disruptive change. And the future has never been as unclear than it is now. In this environment, we need everyone in our organisations to be involved in looking at the future.

So, back to the question: where should we go to look for information about the forces shaping our world? The answer very much depends on what industry you’re on, what your job function is, and what interests you. But there are some general options that provide great starting points. Here are some of the places our team at TomorrowToday go looking for information about the future.

Solution: Sources for tracking future trends

The best place to start is to follow Graeme Codrington’s Twitter feed: http://www.twitter.com/futuristgraeme

Look specifically at his Future of Work list: http://bit.ly/FutureofWorkTwitter

If you’re not on Twitter, then these Blogs and websites will be good starting points:

Magazines:

YouTube channels:

You can also contact us directly at TomorrowToday for more information on our video series ‘Thinking Like a Futurist’, or click here for some information.

(TomorrowToday’s Tips on Tuesdays are weekly emails that offer short practical tips on how you as a leader or organisation can succeed in this fast changing world. Topics include leadership, understanding different generations, parenting, adapting to change, technology that helps you and anything else our team think will help you make this world we work in a better one for all. You can subscribe here.)

Carel is an investor in people and businesses, believing that 1+1 = (at least) 22. Working with a few basic concepts – best encapsulated in his believe that unless we are dead, anything is possible – Carel aims to build long-term sustainable value with like-minded individuals and companies, while having (a lot of!) fun.