Verne Wheelwright's blog

Recently, I’ve been reading blogs. Lots of blogs! Specifically, I’ve been reading blogs by futurists or about the future. I asked members of the Association of Professional futurists for their suggestions, and I asked the World Futures Studies Federation listserv readers for suggestions. Now, I'm asking you and other blog readers from the World Future Society for suggestions.

At this point, I have a list of about 170 blogs (it changes quickly!), and I think the list will grow.

Recently (October), the Association of Professional Futurists (APF) held a very interesting event. Something like a webinar, but it lasted eighteen hours, starting in Europe and the U.K. in mid-day, moving on to Washington D.C., Houston, Hawaii and ending in Australia, mid-afternoon. Lots of speakers who offered several new ideas or challenges.
My contribution was to suggest that the field or profession was about to experience serious change, starting with substantial growth. I came to that conclusion largely through my work with the APF Student Recognition Program, which began in 2008. That year, we found eleven universities around the world that were offering Masters’ degrees for work in Foresight and Futures Studies.

This will happen again, so remember this name “APF Virtual Gathering.”
APF (Association of Professional Futurists) started talking about an event of this type several years ago, but the technology just wasn’t up to the task. Now it is. The software was Adobe Contact, and there were a few glitches —I was (electronically) kicked off the call about four minutes before my presentation, but got back online in time. Jim Dator wasn’t as lucky, he was never able to connect. But the event worked. Much better than most of the webinars I’ve been involved with. All in all, it was a great event.
But I guess I haven’t really told you much about it so here goes, because you will want to remember this.

For as long as I can remember, I’ve been fascinated by pendulums. Mostly in clocks, then in Poe’s story, “The Pit and the Pendulum.” Then there was the huge pendulum at the Chicago Museum of Science and Industry when I was about twelve—it made quite an impression on me.

It has been far too long since the last post to this blog, for which I apologize. So I’m going to ramble a bit to bring you up to date.

In July, I attended the World Future Society conference in Vancouver, B.C., which is one of my favorite cities. Brought back lots of good memories. The conference was very good—lots of good speakers and sessions. This annual event is almost like a reunion with lots of good friends, since I’ve been participating at WFS for over ten years. In addition, the Association of Professional Futurist held a session for their members the day before the conference.

That’s the title of our pre-conference workshop at the World Future Society conference in Vancouver next month (C-8 on July 8), but what does that title really mean? High-falutin’ words, but will there be substance?
We (workshop leaders Ufuk Tarhan and Verne Wheelwright) think so. This workshop will take you places you’ve thought about and wanted to explore, but haven’t taken the time to actually tackle.

A regional business newspaper, the Valley Business Report, is sponsoring a Foresight Workshop for business people in May in Mission, Texas. This will be about futures/foresight methods and how to apply those methods in business, particularly in small business. This is a four-hour workshop, which allows business people to attend in the morning and be back in their offices in the afternoon.
The format that I’m planning is a personal futures approach, then a discussion of how each tool or method can be applied in a small business. As a result, I’m working on a supplemental workbook for small business.

In February, I’ll be attending a conference in Mumbai (Bombay), India. The conference is the “World HRD Congress” for Human Resource Development professionals.
Why is a futurist attending a conference for HR professionals? Because the organizers have asked me to speak about how Personal Futures can help them train leaders and potential leaders in their organizations in long term thinking—foresight. The title of my presentation is “Leadership and the Long-Term Perspective.”

For some time, I’ve been working on an updated version of the Personal Futures workbook. I am just about ready to post the new edition (4th) at www.personalfutures.net. I’ve sent out some review copies to check for errors, but will have the new workbook posted by the 15th.

What’s new?

If you’ve followed the three previous blogs or the Personal Futures Workbook, you should have a personal strategic plan for the next ten years. Your plan includes three parts:
• A vision— a mental image of your life ten years from now.
• An action plan composed of strategies and a timetable for execution of each strategy.
• A contingency plan—actions to take when a low-probability, high-impact event occurs.
Now is the time to do some analysis before you put your plan into effect.