JimCarroll

Upcoming keynote: The Future of Recreation

October 9, 2009 by JimCarroll

I head to Salt Lake City next week; I’ll be the opening keynote speaker for the annual conference of the National Recreation and Parks Association.

GovPro News recently ran a press release on my keynote, commenting:

The recession has created an atmosphere of anxiety and uncertainty for many, and those who work in the parks and recreation field are not immune. With so many forces – the economy, politics, and social and leisure trends, for example – out of the control of parks and recreation professionals, thinking about the future could cause a few sleepless nights.

Futurist Jim Carroll has helped hundreds of organizations minimize their sleepless nights when preparing for the future, and he will discuss some of the upcoming challenges and opportunities in the field of parks and recreation when he delivers the keynote address at the National Recreation and Parks Association’s (NRPA) annual Congress and Exposition in Salt Lake City.

So what will I be talking about? The NRPA ran an interview with me in their September issue which is worth a read; I discuss some of the challenges and trends that we face in terms of the future of parks and recreation, and the innovative mindsets that will help folks cope with a future which is faster, more complex, and certainly full of opportunity.

As NRPA Chief Executive Officer Barbara Tulipane commented in the GovPro release: “In these difficult economic times, it will be refreshing and instructive to learn from one of the truly great minds in strategic planning…. Attendees will leave the conference well-armed with a variety of tools and strategies to help them successfully confront the challenges of the coming year.”

Read NRPA article: What the Future Holds
visit 2009 NRPA Congress and Exposition Web site

Article : The Future of Energy

October 1, 2009 by JimCarroll

There’s no doubt that one of the biggest issues facing the planet and its inhabitants in the coming decades is how we treat the dual challenges of energy and the environment. For years, I’ve been advising my clients about one of the biggest trends related to these two issues: the rapid emergence of an intelligent energy infrastructure. It’s happening now – all around you – and the implications are pretty huge in terms of economic growth. The big question is, what role can accountants play as this infrastructure builds?

From a high level, the trend unfolding is that we will be able to more directly and individually control how we use energy resources, giving each of us ways to reduce our own environmental footprint.

We’re seeing small steps already today: for example, I just bought the new IP Thermostat app for my iPhone; it provides instant access to the two Internet-enabled Proliphix thermostats in my home and ski chalet/cottage. (I could link to my thermostats before via a web page, but IP Thermostat makes it seamless and fast.) The technology allows me to actively manage my energy consumption and better manage my environmental footprint. A world in which hundreds of millions of people are doing the same thing would put a serious dent into heating and air-conditioning usage.

Such devices are just a small example of a number of major trends that will lead to more of this type of connectivity becoming mainstream. For example, major industrial players are adding intelligence to the next generation of commercial, industrial and residential heating, ventilation and air-conditioning equipment, to allow for remote monitoring, management and rapid response to out-of-norm operations.

The advent of the “smart grid” – an electrical system that operates on a more efficient, cost-effective basis through the use of information technology – is another example. It’s not all hype; Cisco recently suggested that the connectivity component of energy infrastructure will be worth more than US$100 billion over five years. That’s some serious spending.

And if we consider the new role of analytics, in that such connectivity will allow consumers and users to better understand their usage, and allow more intelligent demand.

The Positive Energy initiative, for example, encourages hydro utilities to send out electrical bills that compare your usage to that of your neighbours. If you’re efficient, you get some smiley faces on your bill. If not, you get some images that would encourage you to do better. It’s a unique, simple idea, and yet it provides a glimpse into where we can go in the future if we allow people to take a more analytical, deeper view of how they use energy, and hence, impact the environment.

Imagine that as we build this intelligent, connected energy system we can provide tools allowing consumers to further manage their household energy use. For example, software tools could allow them to query an energy provider for details on how well their fridge was operating compared to neighbourhood norms, how much they could save by purchasing a more efficient microwave, or how much money they are losing by postponing that oil change on their 10-year-old hyper-connected car.

We know that everything around us is beginning to plug into the cloud.

There might be unique opportunities to consider how we can maximize the potential for insight as this occurs.

Insight on deep, transformation change – and the “next economy”

September 28, 2009 by JimCarroll

Next week, I’ll be in Jacksonville, as the lunch time keynote speaker for the annual meeting of the Materials Handling Association of America. We’ll have about 300 executives in the room, from a broad cross section of North American industry.

My topic? “Moving Beyond the Meltdown: Aligning Yourself for Growth Through Innovation“.

In the last twelve months, I’ve had a unique first hand opportunity to witness what’s happening on the ground throughout corporate North America as companies have grappled with the recession. Throughout this time, I’ve been fortunate enough to speak at a wide variety of leadership meetings, management get-togethers and other corporate events for a fascinating list of Fortune 500 organizations, as well as many prestigious national associations.

And in my own small way, I’ve been busy helping people to understand what they need to do to innovate their way into the “next economy.” That’s because there are an increasing number of CEO’s or other members of senior management who are bringing me in, in order to help place emphasis on their message of the urgency of change.

What’s clear is that we are in the midst of a pretty significant economic transformation. As Mick Fleming at the American Chamber of Commerce put it recently: “It’s going to be this move from a bad economy, to the next economy.”

What is the shape of that next economy? The scope of the change can be seen in the types of deep, transformational change that is underway in many an industry. Consider manufacturing – clearly, we’re moving from a world of mass production, to mass customization and agility-based manufacturing. I often use the example of Honda, as noted in a Bloomberg news article back in 2008:

“Honda’s assembly lines can switch models in as little as 10 days ….. by contrast, it could take months for most rivals to make the same change.”

Clearly, the Detroit based old manufacturing business model was seriously and deeply flawed. The newer model, based on agility and flexibility is the model that will take may manufacturers into the future.

There’s a similar fundamental transformation underway in many other industries — and to understand the link between future trends and innovation, you must get into that mindset. Take health care — 20 years from now, it will look nothing like it does today, as we move to a world of preventative medicine.

And what’s really happening with the global economy are a number of trends that point to growth:

There are a tremendous number of new companies and new industries being built around the high velocity of ideas that surround us – which is increasing the pace of business startups;
New ideas continue to be explored, markets grow, and industries emerge as rapid innovation occurs in health care, agriculture and countless other fields. It’s all about rapid science today — and exponential knowledge growth leading to faster discovery of the “next thing”
Business model innovation continues unabated : I’m seeing revolutionary trends with mobile text message based banking systems, for example
Small organizations continue to have the advantage of capitalizing on opportunity quicker; today, it’s all about speed, and these are the innovators who often win in big markets. Just look at what’s going on in pharmaceutical research, where the majority of new discoveries are happening in small labs

It’s easy during a time of economic volatility to lose sight of where the global economy is really headed. Yet while stock markets might rock, innovation thrives.

What’s my role? In each and every case, the individuals who have engaged me know that their industry and the world they live in is set for deep, systemic, transformational change. They have a compelling sense of urgency. They know that maybe the rest of their team does not share the sentiment; they’re suffering from organizational sclerosis; their ability to understand the future is clogged up by todays’ short term focus.

Leaders today know that they need to wake their people up, shake them out of their complacency, and give them a clear understanding that they had better start thinking about the future — and fast — in order to keep up with high velocity change.

And perhaps, if they are lucky, stay one step ahead of everyone else.

Material Handling Association of America – 2009 annual conference
Blog post: Are you watching the major transformations, or just the piddly stuff?

Failing at the future: 10 reasons why some companies will miss out on the economic upturn!

September 23, 2009 by JimCarroll

Just over a year ago, the global economy changed.

What has it changed to? When I keynoted the Missouri Governor Economic Development conference in St. Louis two weeks ago, I offered this quote from the American Chamber of Commerce: “It’s going to be this move from a bad economy, to the next economy.”

What is that next economy? No one is certain, but what we can be sure of is that many industries will be fundamentally different; business models will continue to evolve at a faster pace; new revenue opportunities will continue to emerge; customer expectations will ramp up in terms of quality and service; we’ll see the ongoing emergence of new competitors; product life-cycles will continue to shorten as innovation speeds up; and a lot of transformative change will occur in markets and industries as really innovative people continue to shake up the fundamentals.

So how are companies adapting to these realities?

Since the events of last year, I’ve been out on the road working with dozens of organizations. I’ve seen and have worked with two different types of organizations and leaders. I’ve seen innovation failures — companies that are stuck in their economic rut, and unable to figure out what to do next. In other cases, I’ve encountered some real pioneers and fast-movers. They are the innovation leaders — they have the same sentiment that I posted in a blog a year ago, in that they know they can’t panic — they have to go forward by innovating, changing and adapting.

So what’s holding the innovation laggards back? I think there are several common attributes:

Fear of the unknown: I still see many organizations who are driven by uncertainty. What happens if our market doesn’t recover? What happens if we can’t rebuild the top line? What happens if our customers don’t start spending again? So much fear and uncertainty causes a form of leadership and organization wide paralysis to set in; they’re like deer caught in a headlight, and are frozen in time. Avoid that fate – and fast!
Inertia is easy: when confronted by change, many people react by …. doing nothing. When things are uncomfortable, the easiest thing to do to deal with that discomfort is to avoid it. Such thinking causes many organizations and the people within them to fall asleep. They keep doing what they’ve been doing before the recession, hoping that will carry them forward into our next, different economy. Obviously that can’t work, for a whole variety of different reasons.
It’s easy to avoid tough decisions : organizations are faced with a lot of change, in terms of business models, customer expectations, cost pressures, new competitors, and countless other challenges. To deal with any one of these issues requires tough decisions, but in many cases, it’s easier to put those decisions off into the future rather than having to deal with them.
An unwillingness to confront the truth: your product might be out of date; your brand might not been seen as relevant and keeping up to date with fast paced innovation in your marketplace; your sales force might be wildly out of date in terms of their product knowledge; your competitors might have a more efficient cost structure because they made the heavy IT investments that you did not. I could go on, but the point is this: you might have serious systemic problems, and are simply unable or unwilling to focus on fixing them. Have a reality check, and use that as a catalyst for action.
A short term focus: you are still caught up in the economic-downturn hysteria headlines, and don’t think about business trends longer than three months. By doing so, you are missing out on the fascinating transformations occurring in many markets and industries, and don’t see the key drivers for future economic growth, with the result that you aren’t capitalizing on them. Innovative organizations have moved beyond the meltdown, and are already busy positioning themselves for the inevitable long term recovery.
A culture that is risk adverse: so far, you’ve survived through cautious, careful manoeuvres. Yet the recession has left you naked with that strategy: going forward now requires trying to do a lot of things you haven’t done before. You’ve got a culture that doesn’t accept such thinking. Change that — now!
Paralyzed by the fear of failure: related to your risk aversion is a culture that abhors mistakes. Anyone who errs is shunned; people whisper quietly about what went wrong, and what it might mean. Can that thinking: you should take your failures and put them up on a pedestal. It’s more important that you try things out, and learn about this new fast paced, post-recession world, since what worked for you in the past obviously won’t work for you in the future.
Failure to adapt at fast markets : I’m dealing with companies that know that constant innovation with top line revenue — which means product and service innovation — is now all about time to market. You’ve got to have an innovation pipeline that is constantly inventing and reinventing the next revenue driver. What you sold in the past — you might not sell tomorrow. How are you going to fix that? By getting into the mindset of the high velocity economy.
A refusal or unwillingness to adapt to new methodologies and ideas: in the manufacturing sector, it’s all about Manufacturing 2.0 or 3.0 or the next phase … in every industry, there is no shortage of new ideas, methodologies, processes, and fundamental change in terms of how to get things done. Maybe you’ve closed your mind off to new ideas, with the result that you fail to see how your competitors are rapidly shifting their structure, capabilities, time to market, product line, and other fundamentals. Wake up — we’re in the era of the global idea machine, and the result is that there is a tremendous amount of transformative thinking out there about how to do things differently. Tune in, turn on, and rethink!
A loss of confidence: this economic downturn has had the effect of causing such widespread damage in various industries that some people and organizations and leaders have lost their faith in the future. They aren’t certain they can compete, adapt and change. Perhaps this is the biggest challenge of all to overcome — but you can only overcome it by getting out of your innovation rut and moving forward.

Bill Gates once observed that “We always overestimate the change that will occur in the next two years and underestimate the change that will occur in the next ten. Don’t let yourself be lulled into inaction.”

It couldn’t have been put better. What’s your choice – to be an innovation leader, aware of where we are going in the future, or an innovation laggard, still mired in short term thinking?

Think growth!

What’s next with economic development? My report from Missouri ….

September 22, 2009 by JimCarroll

Two weeks ago, I was featured as the closing speaker at the 2009 Governor’s Conference on Economic Development, the 51st annual event of this type. Governor Jay Nixon addressed the crowd on Thursday, Sept 10th, noting in his keynote that:

To compete – and win — in the 21st century, we must encourage entrepreneurship and small-business growth; enhance our workforce; and embrace emerging science and technology as critical industries of tomorrow.

I followed up with a closing keynote on Friday that took a look at the trends occurring with small business, workforce trends, and the rapid pace of innovation in various markets : particularly, energy, the environment, and what I’ve come to call “manufacturing 2.0.” Here’s the session description:

What Comes Next: And What Should We Do About It?

Is there a future out there? Definitely yes, but a constant drumbeat of negative news can cause people to lose sight of what will happen as we return to a period of economic growth.

That’s where Jim Carroll comes in — this noted international futurist, trends & innovation expert spends his time with globally innovative leaders. He’s gained keen insight into some of the key trends which will impact industries, organizations and careers in the next few years to come, in a wide variety of industries from health care, to technology and manufacturing, to the skilled trades.

Jim is a passionate believer that we live in transformative times — and in five or ten years, will look back at this time with awe at the new industries, products, careers, and opportunities that were developed.

Jim Carroll will challenge you to focus on the opportunities of today and tomorrow, rather than the challenges of the past.

There have been quite a few economic development related talks as of late ; it’s my belief that with the downturn, a lot of people have lost sight of the transformational change that is occurring in many industries, particularly with leading edge innovation and future trends, and what local economic development officers might be doing to capitalize on those trends.

Area Development Magazine, a publication that focuses on this area, noted recently that “it’s impossible to succeed at economic development and be a pessimist.”

What I’ve been doing is to help to bring a sense of optimism to those in the room.

Achieving growth: innovation in the post recession economy

September 22, 2009 by JimCarroll

I’m thrilled that Microsoft has asked me to be the opening speaker for a number of events this fall, related to the Windows 7 launch. We will be talking to CIO’s, CFO’s and CTO’s for a wide variety of organizations from multiple different industries.

My talk with focus on the theme: “Achieving Growth! Why Innovators Will Rule in the Post-Recession Economy–And How You Can Join Them!“; and specifically:

“Jim will share his insight into the key trends facing every organization, and the methods by which organizations are positioning themselves for the rapidly changing economy of the 21st century, where time-to-market is the new metric, and fast-innovation rules.”

This has been an area of heavy focus for me through the last year, as the economic downturn took hold. I’ve had the opportunity to watch and study what a wide variety of organizations have been doing to keep a growth orientation.

There are many, many clients who are booking me because the CEO or senior management realizes they need to quickly re-align the thinking of their team towards growth; and through discussion with me, have discovered that I can play an extremely useful role in helping them accomplish this.

Who’s working with me? I’ve had recent and upcoming engagements with General Dynamics / Northrop Grumman ; the 2009 Missouri Governor Economic Development Congress; Signature Travel global owners meeting; Microsoft; the US National Recreation and Parks Association; Yum! Brands; Burger King; US Department of Defence – Commissary Agency ; Rockwell Collins; Oracle ….. all of these organizations have engaged me for a keynote or leadership meeting focused on future trends, innovation and growth!

Think growth!

JimCarroll

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THE FUTURE BELONGS TO THOSE WHO ARE FAST features the best of the insight from Jim Carroll’s blog, in which he covers issues related to creativity, innovation and future trends.

THE FUTURE BELONGS TO THOSE WHO ARE FAST features the best of the insight from Jim Carroll’s blog, in which he
covers issues related to creativity, innovation and future trends.