“Are You Ready for a ‘Fast Future?”

Last week, I was the keynote speaker for the Medical Device and Manufacturing event in Philadelphia. I’ll be doing two more in the fall — one in Chicago and the other in San Francisco.

I was featured on the main show floor — given there were a number of packaging and other manufacturing going on at the same in the cavernous space that is the Philadelphia Convention Center, we had a pretty varied attendance.

But I concentrated my message on the rapid changes that are and will occur with the future of medical devices — particularly consumer-Internet-connected devices, the virtualization of the hospital, and what happens when Silicon Valley takes over the pace of medical device R&D.

The Medical Device & Diagnostic Industry publication picked up on my talk with this short article, in particular focusing on the text message poll I ran asking the audience if they felt they were ready for a “fast future.”

Are You Ready for a ‘Fast Future?’ A Snapshot of Audience Reaction at MD&M East

The future belongs to a company that can move fast and adapt quickly to changes.

In 2010, it took Apple 28 days to sell 1-million iPads.

In November 2012, when Apple launched the iPad Mini, the iconic technology company sold three-million fourth-generation iPads and iPad minis in three days.

Global futurist and trend-spotter Jim Carroll shared similar statistics with an audience gathered at the MD&M East Conference and Exposition on Wednesday all in an effort to stress one thing: The future belongs to a company that can move fast and adapt quickly to changes.

A poll at MD&M East gauged how ready audience members feel their companies are to compete in the “fast future.”

To solicit audience input in how ready they were in playing in this so-called fast future, he did a quick poll. Carroll used a texting, Twitter, and cloud-based service to show live results as people entered their reactions. Here’s a snapshot of the results.

It’s interesting that some people in the audience have seemed to already concede the future.

But Carroll reminded audiences that size doesn’t matter when it comes to future success. What matters is the ability to act quickly, make decisions during uncertain times, and remain relentlessly focused on the job at hand.

Carroll said that he has seen many company executives wait to make decisions because the economic recovery was not strong enough or because the uncertainty is too great and the risk too high.

Those companies are guilty of one cardinal sin—“aggressive indecision”—Carroll said, using a term he coined a few years ago.

And that sitting with folded hands awaiting a better time will make them obsolete in the fast future.