[Video] How To Become The Future

Hello Ivana,
Great questions, but really HARD … I have to admit that I can´t answer all of them…
How to find my drive? Sure that I have something which makes me really happy… I feel like in heaven (literally:) when I can be sort of helpful to my students, or when they come to me and want to talk, discuss things and so on. But sometimes it is all about the humbleness to accept the fact when my work isn´t appreciated enough. I think it can help me start from the beginning every morning with new energy and passion. 🙂
Thanks for doing your work, Ivana! I love it! 🙂
M.

Ivana – What a daring and creative approach towards outlining a Future picture, to be redesigned. Here Ivana demonstrates the willingness and ability to identify self – imposed constraints, remove them, and explore the consequences of their removal.
As a follow up I advocate certain areas in which such an approach can be feasible :

Systems Thinking and Interactive Planning

A method of planning that eliminates the need for forecasting, and
substitutes the use of assumptions and contingency planning in its place, because the
ability to forecast and predict is deteriorating at an alarming rate:
1- The society is changing at an accelerating rate, and
2- Complexity is growing at an increasing rate
Assumptions are about possibilities; predictions and forecasts are about
probabilities.
Therefore, any method of planning that is critically dependent on the
accuracy of forecasting is doomed to fail.

Problem Solving Strategies
There are several problem strategies. These include:
1.To absolve — is to ignore a problem and hope it will go away or solve
itself.
2.To resolve — is to select a course of action which yields an outcome
which is good enough, one which “satisfies” the need and objectives of the
system., I.E., Clinical approach.
3.To solve — is to select the course of action that is believed to yield
the best possible outcome, the one that “optimizes.”, I.E., Research approach.
4.To dissolve — is to change the nature of either the system with the
problem or its environment, so as to, in effect, “remove the problem.”, I.E.,
Design approach.

Business Model Innovation — Idealized design as an “open innovation” process
In industry after industry, companies with superior performance are
displaying innovation in the totality of the way they are doing business. This
explains why a recent _IBM survey_
(http://www-1.ibm.com/services/us/bcs/html/bcs_ceostudy2006.html) of over 765 CEO’s shows: Business Model Innovation is on the
top of their list. In the absence of a single genius entrepreneur/leader,
one of the challenges confronting the businesses today is to develop a process
of “open innovation,” that taps into the creativity of the stakeholders and
in particular the employees of the organization to create a successful
business model. Traditional models of innovation, which relied solely on “creative
types,” usually within R&D functions, are being replaced with “open
innovation”. One of the most potent open innovation processes, is idealized design.
Originally conceived as an internal process to facilitate corporate planning,
idealized design thinking is now being used for opportunity recognition.

Trans-formative Leadership
Radical transformations are seldom easy. For things to happen there is a
need to transform management from the old style, command and control, to the new
style, inspiring leadership. Leadership consists of guiding, encouraging, and
facilitating the pursuit by others of ends using means, both of which they
have personally selected or the selection of which they approve. In this
formulation, leadership requires an ability to bring the will of followers into
consonance with that of the leader so they follow him or her voluntarily, with
enthusiasm and dedication.

Development vs. Growth
Growth and development are not the same thing. Neither is necessary for the
other. Nevertheless, many managers take development to be the same as growth.
Most efforts directed at corporate development are actually directed at
corporate growth. To grow is to increase in size or number. To develop is to
increase one’s ability and desire to satisfy one’s own needs and legitimate
desires and those of others. A legitimate desire is one that, when satisfied,
does not impede the development of anyone else. Development of individuals and
corporations is more a matter of learning than earning. It has less to do
with how much one has than how much one can do with whatever one has.
Development is better reflected in quality of life than in standard of
living. Therefore, the level of development of a corporation is better reflected
in the quality of work life it provides its employees than in its
profit-and-loss statement. If an undeveloped country or corporation was flooded with
money it would be richer but no more developed. On the other hand, if a well
developed country or corporation was suddenly deprived of wealth, it would not
be less developed. A well-developed country or corporation can do more with
its resources than one that is less developed. This is not to say that the
amount of resources available is irrelevant. Resources can be used to accelerate
development and improve quality of life, but they can best be used for these
purposes by those who are developed.

Integrative (Synthetic) Project Management (for complex project managers)
Despite significant progress in the development of computer-aided project
management tools to help plan and manage projects, “more often than not capital
projects overrun their budgets, fall behind schedule, and fail to meet their
business objectives.” This apparent paradox stems from the nature of the
“traditional paradigm applied to project management, which relies on existing
knowledge – knowledge gained from studying traditional approaches.”
The current approach has limitations. Generally, it is good for doing
projects in a stable environment. The problem with project performance is
paradigmatic, i.e. using a wrong mindset. The new approach requires the project
managers to mange the interaction of the parts of the project rather than managing
each part separately.

Recreating Capital Projects
Effective capital project management is an important discipline for
international bodies, governments, and corporations because capital projects
typically require large investments and involve significant potential benefits and
risks. A large number of project management techniques and tools have been
developed but this proliferation has not led to great project success. In fact,
the governmental project that meets or exceeds expectations seems almost the
exception rather than the rule. Large corporations do not seem to be doing much
better. Using systems thinking to show how the capital project can be
re-created and improved through integrating successful aspects of various
real-world projects within a systemic framework to develop an improved project
system.

Organizational Learning and Knowledge Management (including the use of channels and platforms To tap into the rich tacit knowledge (knowledge that
resides in people’s heads)
Why do corporations, on average, have shorter life spans than the people who
populate them? Because, say the theorists, people are more capable of
learning from experience than are corporations.
With change the only constant in today’s economy, the key to competitiveness
is the ability to adapt to changes we can’t control and to learn about the
ones we can control. The decline of some well-established firms and the
diminishing competitive power of others have made learning an essential competence
for organizational success.
Organizational learning (OL) is the set of processes and structures that
help people create new knowledge, share their understanding, and continuously
improve themselves and the results of the enterprise. OL builds competencies
for supporting transformation throughout the organizational system. Most
important, it considers human, operational, and technical issues at work,
including ways to build processes and structures that deal with philosophical,
psychological, and sociological forces at play in every organization.
“Building Corporate ‘Black Boxes’: A Different Perspective on.
Organizational
Learning.”
Most of us are familiar with the role of “black boxes” as they exist in
aircraft. We know that they are there to help us learn from mistakes and
thereby improve the performance of aircraft and the aviation system as a whole.
Imagine what would happen if the aviation system did not learn and adapt to
changes quickly and efficiently. Unfortunately, this is the case with most
organizations. Nevertheless, a number of corporations have successfully built
learning and adaptive systems.

Unlearning/Learning Organizations – The Role of Mindset
Most learning by adults and organizations occurs when something new replaces
in the
mind that which was previously thought to be known, that is, unlearning.
Unlearning
must frequently precede or at least occur simultaneously with learning.
Nevertheless, the
literature on organizational learning has virtually ignored the unlearning
process until
recently when few authors have given it some attention. Research in the
field of
organizational learning and knowledge management shows that learning and
adaptation
takes place much more easily within the prevailing mindset (view of the
world) than
outside of it.
Unlearning is a challenge because the human tendency to preserve a
particular view of
the world is very strong and the change to a new paradigm not only requires
an ultimate
act of learning but also of unlearning.
Our assumptions about the nature of reality can impose the most severe
restrictions on
our ability to learn. Unlearning these assumptions requires raising them to
consciousness
and this can occur only when we confront the dilemmas that they create.
Therefore,
raising our worldview to consciousness is among the most important things we
can do to
enhance our learning and unlearning. It is possible to design systems that
not only facilitate learning and unlearning within the prevailing worldview
but it can generate questions about the adequacy of the assumptions that make
up that concept of reality.
Sketching out a framework that identifies these areas of fruitful futures research may focus our minds on adequate changes in the future to come.
For a concrete example in the field of transportation and the city ,the following promising approach can be considered feasible :
By combining the redesign of the urban automobile with the redesign of the city it should be possible to improve significantly the quality of the life in the city and to approach equality of opportunity for all dwellers independently of their background and socioeconomic characteristics. In this way efforts to solve the transportation problem can be converted into a program for general and extensive redesign of the city and life within it.

Brilliant, Loved the Video and Your Presentation