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Welcome to your exclusive Mind Tools member newsletter, designed to help you survive and thrive at work. Each week, you’ll find personal insight and advice from the mindtools.com editors, and from our network of thought leaders, researchers and coaches.
This week, as we enter the new year, we’re focusing on personal futures: what they might look like, and how to manage them.
Then scroll down for our Tip of the Week, about keeping on top of your planning efforts, and our News Roundup.
You, the Futurist
By Tracey Follows, CEO of Futuremade and author of "The Future of You"
For the last decade or so, I have been helping organizations of all types in a variety of sectors to better prepare themselves for the future.
Back in 2015, I was one of very few futurists visibly working in the corporate sector in the U.K., mainly commissioned by marketing directors, innovation labs or strategic planning departments to help solve specific problems.
But during the pandemic, and since, more people have come to better appreciate futures and foresight.
This is partly due to the shock many felt when the world seemingly changed overnight. It is also because we are culturally more orientated toward the future than the past now – busy ripping up traditions and replacing them with newly acquired belief systems.
And, while people were stuck at home in 2020 and 2021, communicating by Zoom, many took advantage of online study in the futures field, learning the techniques and tools of strategic foresight.
Now, as we step into 2024, something else has changed.
From Bitcoin to Flatter Organizations
I've worked for a long time with organizations, but now I'm working with individuals too. I'm doing as much work around Personal Futures as I am in Corporate Futures, employing strategic foresight more widely.
I am riding what I see as a megatrend, responsible for a shift in power away from institutions and toward individuals.
This is the Decentralization Trend.
As the internet-based connectivity between people, things and places fully emerges, we're leaving behind linear, hierarchical, top-down systems. We’re embracing more peer-to-peer, participatory, flatter ones instead.
You might first have seen this appear in the world of decentralized finance.
Cryptocurrencies, based on new protocols and trust-less machine networks, delivered new systems. These didn’t require a central authority to grant permission to participate. Participation was automatic, and on a level playing field. It spawned Bitcoin, Ethereum and a whole host of new ways of doing things – and a host of new things to which we now assign value.
Decentralization is not confined to finance. It is uprooting the creative and media industries, reinventing fashion, manufacturing and many other traditional industries too. It will also eventually reinvent the way we think about organizing business.
Who Sets the Rules?
Decentralized Autonomous Organizations (DAOs) have been an interesting experiment in what might happen when most participants in a group, club or business have a say in its governance.
With the invention of crypto tokens, those who are engaged enough in a network to hold them can have a say in how the group is run. This leads to flatter, fairer organizational structures – something many companies should be thinking about as emerging issues of intergenerational fairness increase.
This trend also signifies another important change: that individuals will have more say in how organizations are run and what their rules are. Individuals will be in more need of foresight and futures capabilities than the organization itself.
Practicing Foresight
More people are opting for self-employment or need to be more flexible and adaptive in their roles and responsibilities in employment.
They need to be able to plan for alternatives rather than relying on patterns from the past. And they’ll need to understand foresight practices, and apply them confidently in their everyday life and work.
When considering this, the best place to start is to think about your own role in the world.
What are you trying to achieve? What are you here to create? And what is it that you’ll look back on in the future? Will you feel fulfilled?
The future is plural. There are many alternative possible futures open to us. We create them and we also create a preference for one over another, which in turn leads to the future we end up with.
What Future Do You Want?
If you don’t know what future you want to create for yourself, how could you possibly even begin to think about the future you would like to create for your business, your brand or your organization?
Understanding your role in creating the future of something bigger than yourself begins with understanding and creating your own role in the future – the future of yourself. So, when you hear doom-laden predictions about the future, know that that future is in your hands.
It’s in the hands and hearts of every one of us to create the future we want – both in our professional and our personal lives. Human agency is all we really have, but when it is put to use it is the most effective resource in the world.
In 2024, think about how you will use your agency to create the best future for you.
What's Next?
How do you navigate your way toward the future you want?
First you need to get a handle on your current situation. Start from where you are. Then, develop your understanding of where you want to be or where you want your team to be.
Then, plan toward that future. You won’t be able to foresee every possibility, but if you stay curious and plan as far as possible for disruption, you stand a much greater chance of getting the future you want.
These Mind Tools resources are a great place to start:
Managing in a VUCA World Meet volatility with vision, uncertainty with understanding, complexity with clarity and ambiguity with agility.
The Futures Wheel Infographic Learn to deal with the unexpected challenges the future might bring.
9 Ways to Future Proof Your Career Focus on developing the skills and attitudes you need to take control of your future.
And you can read or listen to Mind Tools’ exclusive interview with Tracey Follows.
Tip of the Week
Review Your Plans
By Simon Bell, Mind Tools Writer and Editor
Plans, plans, plans. Everyone’s got them, particularly at this time of year. But how do you make sure yours work for you? Well, you need to monitor them, and not be afraid to change them when necessary.
And once everything’s done? Look back over your plan and do a proper review.
For more complex plans, review the way it all went with everyone else who was involved in the planning process. During your review, consider four questions:
- What aspects of your plan worked well?
- What didn’t work so well?
- Was there anything that you failed to anticipate during the planning process?
- What could you do differently in future to make your plans more effective?
People often miss out this review step. They want to move on to the next thing. But it's always worthwhile, to help you plan even better in future.
Why not try out one of the five approaches to reviewing suggested in this article – even if you don't follow Agile project management: Sprint Retrospectives.
Pain Points Podcast
Don't miss the latest episode of our “Pain Points” podcast!
Every week, Jonathan Hancock and guests discuss a common workplace challenge and share their experiences and learning. Past topics include delegation, distractions and interviewing.
Hear stories, insights and tips from people who understand the challenges we all face at work – in “Pain Points,” the new podcast exclusive to Mind Tools members.
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News Roundup
This Week's Global Workplace Insights
Autonomy Beats a Free Lunch
Free yoga sessions not your idea of workplace wellbeing? You’re not alone.
New research from the London School of Economics (LSE) suggests that workplace wellbeing initiatives, such as meditation apps and free lunches, are ineffective in engaging employees and developing a culture of wellbeing.
The (admittedly small) study, conducted by LSE’s The Inclusion Initiative, interviewed 100 people in banking, finance, and professional services, finding that none were in favor of such initiatives. Instead, employees preferred autonomy in working conditions, with 51 percent citing the benefits of having the power to decide when, where, and how they worked.
The Beyond Workplace Wellbeing Framework proposed by LSE emphasizes minimizing negative workplace aspects like bullying and burnout and creating psychologically safe environments. The researchers recommend a shift from paternalistic to trust-based employer approaches.
Five Days in Four?
The demand for a four-day workweek is increasing among U.S. workers, with over 75 percent stating they could complete their workload in four days, according to a survey by Fiverr, an online job marketplace for freelancers.
Millennials are particularly passionate about the idea, with 87 percent expressing support. The survey also revealed a preference for in-person interactions over remote work, especially among younger workers seeking more flexibility in their schedules.
The shift reflects a changing workplace value system where employees want to be assessed based on outcomes rather than the number of hours worked. Such practices haven’t been widely adopted by U.S. companies yet, while other regions of the world are seeing positive results from early experiments.
Read more in this CNBC article: Many U.S. workers say they could complete the same work in 4 days as in 5.
If you want to find out more about how you might adapt to a shorter working week check out our article, How to Get More Done in Less Time. And explore whether Managing in a Results-Only Environment might be right for you and your team.
See you next week for more member-exclusive content and insight from the Mind Tools team!
