How to think like a futurist
Preparing yourself and your organization for what’s to come
Thinking like a futurist is about more than spotting interesting trends and potential new technologies, it’s about preparing yourself and your organization for what’s to come. As our world continues to shift and evolve, it’s increasingly important to develop a future-focused mindset and pay attention to evolving trends and technologies. With a futurist mindset, you can help increase resilience, adaptability, and success for your business. This shift in thinking will give you a level of preparedness that will make you feel like you’re ready for anything that comes your way. Instead of feeling like you’re constantly trying to play catch up to all the new technologies and management styles, you’ll feel better prepared to make any necessary changes and adapt.
Did you know that only 35% of Americans think about their five-year future on a regular basis? This is called the “future gap,” and those who aren’t thinking of their futures are at a disadvantage to those who frequently ponder and plan for the years to come. The more you think about the future and all its possibilities, the more you’ll be able to spot trends, patterns, and other important events that may be essential to the success of your organization. In order to create the future that we want for ourselves and our companies, we cannot simply rely on short-term and reactive thinking. Instead, we must all become futurists.
But how does one start to think like a futurist?
“To create something new or to make a change in your own life, you first have to be able to imagine things different. And the future is a place where everything can be different,” says Jane McGonigal, a professor who teaches a class on futurism for Stanford’s Continuing Studies program. For those who are unable to take her class, she provides three exercises that will help you think like a futurist in this article:
- Predict the past.
Predicting the past may seem like a contradiction, but the exercise is key in helping futurists spot patterns and understand that the future isn’t inevitable. To do this, think about a choice you made this morning, or earlier this week. Now, imagine you’d made a different choice. How would this have affected your day or week? What would be different? - Remember the future.
Remembering the future is similar to visualization, in the sense that you imagine a future desired outcome. The next step is to work backwards and figure out a realistic explanation for how this outcome came to fruition. Through doing this, your brain registers the outcome as more likely to happen, since it has created a memory of the event. - Practice hard empathy.
Lastly, hard empathy is imagining going through an experience that is entirely foreign to you. McGonigal suggests imagining living the life of a complete stranger, from a country you are unfamiliar with. What is their family like? Where do they live? What do they eat? What do they do for work? By completely removing ourselves from our own lives and instead imagining another, we can view everything in a new light. Together, these three “what if” scenarios can build key habits for future-focused thinking. So how can you bring this into your business?
In a recent blog, Andrew Bolwell, HP’s Chief Disrupter, outlined how leaders and businesses can prepare themselves for the future. He recommends adopting an innovation mindset, continuously learning, and collaborating. Get to know people outside of your team and field and learn about what they do and how they do it. By leaving your silo, you can expand the way you think and consider new perspectives. Question any existing assumptions you or your organization may have and instead ask how things could be improved or optimized for best performance. Research and learn about new things and encourage your employees to go down the occasional rabbit hole. Connect with people on your team and in your field and discuss new ideas and interesting trends. Create a healthy collaboration culture that allows people to feel free to express new concepts and perspectives.
Bolwell also suggests paying attention to emerging technology trends. At HP, we focus on what we call Megatrends, which allow us to predict and anticipate where the world is heading and identify opportunities with our customers, Partners, and employees. By staying up to date on these trends, we have been able to stay ahead of change and reinvent for an uncertain future. Every year, HP releases a Megatrends report that outlines the global technological, economic, and social shifts that are influencing how the world’s population will live and work in the future. This year’s report explores how innovation and disruptions in automation, data, economics, and energy are impacting megatrends.
Vincent Brissot, HP’s Vice President of Worldwide Digital Automation Experience & Channel Operations, also promotes continuous learning as a key step towards building a growth mindset: “The foundation of a growth mindset is the willingness to be a lifelong learner. With the evolution of online learning, anyone can further or enhance his or her education…With learning, effort, exploration, and practice, people can always keep growing, and when the information is literally at your fingertips, there’s no excuse not to take advantage of an opportunity to better yourself.”
It’s important to be open and accepting of failure. It’s impossible to perfectly predict the future, and a futurist must be open to being wrong. In fact, this will simply give you more practice in adapting to change, as well as hone your ability to think in the long-term.
