Jim Carroll was a featured keynote speaker at the Texas Credit Union League (TCUL) Annual Meeting in 2009, speaking to credit union leaders from across the state at one of the industry’s most important annual gatherings. The event brought together CEOs, senior executives, and board members to engage with the strategic challenges and opportunities facing the credit union sector in a rapidly changing financial environment. Jim provided a futurist perspective on the trends reshaping banking, technology, consumer expectations, and financial services — and what credit unions needed to do to innovate, adapt, and lead. His message resonated with an industry audience eager to find competitive footholds in an era of significant disruption.
Change – Deal with It!
One of the events I have coming up is in May in Las Vegas. I’ll be the opening keynote speaker for a global organization, with about 3,500 people in the room.
It’s interesting to learn that one of the things that caught the attention of this group was my “Change: Deal with It” video.
My sons and I filmed this a few years ago; we put some signs up along what we call the “squirrel highway” in the yard; we left the camera on for an hour; and we caught this little fellow and the interruption to his routine.
It’s kind of a cute video, and since I’m on March break this week skiing and not thinking too much, I thought it would make for a great blog post!
Enjoy!
Things You Need to Do Right Now to Focus on the Future!
I’ve got a tremendous number of keynotes coming up for April through June, ranging from a global leadership meeting for a world QSR company, to meetings with Trane (Ingersoll Rand), Rockwell Collins, the Texas State Credit Union Cooperative, to the National Association of Children’s Hospitals (both of the latter events being in Austin, Texas.) Among many others!
I’m also keynoting a group of companies involved in the fast paced senior citizens housing industry. The keynote description just came out in their brochure, and provides a good overview of the types of things I’m focusing on today:
Innovating at high velocity is vital to turning challenge into opportunity. Jim Carroll believes that organizations that focus on staying ahead of fast paced economic trends can “ride this thing out,” and can position themselves for growth. It’s a fast paced world — and that’s why leading edge organizations are focused on key leadership strategies that provide for a fast paced future.
Innovative organizations succeed by mastering the pace of the new high velocity economy. And in an era of economic challenge, they focus on discovering opportunity! That means learning how to turn ideas into action!
Taking advantage of new continuing care strategies as an opportunity to be pursued rather than a challenge to be overcome. In an era in which boomers will demand more choice in retirement living, customer service strategies become essential, and operational and service excellence become new critical success factors.
As an author, columnist, media commentator, and consultant, Carroll is completely focused on creativity and innovation, insight that is captured in his books, Ready, Set, Done! How to Innovate When Faster is the New Fast and What I Learned From Frogs in Texas: Saving Your Skin with Forward Thinking Innovation.
In this keynote, noted futurist, trends & innovation expert Jim Carroll will challenge you to focus on the opportunities of today and tomorrow, rather than the challenges of the past. Jim’s client list includes the BBC, the Walt Disney Corporation,and Readers Digest Food & Entertainment group, the publisher of Everyday with Rachel Ray.
Jim will bring us customized insight, wisdom, and inspiration to help us achieve breakthrough innovations and absolutely compelling levels of creativity.
Keynote: “…. a whirlwind of a speech….”
Back in November, I had the honor of providing the opening keynote address for the Picture Archive Council of America, at the 13th Annual PACA conference, in New York City.
This organization represents stock photographers : the folks who supply the amazing shots and footage used by advertising agencies, publishers, magazines and countless other groups in need of great creativity. A vastly diverse group, ranging from global powerhouses like Getty Images and Corbis, to small boutique specialty photographers. They’ve had a bit of a struggle as of late: advertising is down with the recession; they’re impacted by the emergence of new cost competitors; and ongoing challenges with copyright infringement.
I did a tremendous amount of research into their industry, and really walked off stage thinking I hit a home run. That’s why it’s nice to find this feedback from one of their recent newsletters:
Jim Carroll describes himself as an ‘International futurist, trends and innovation expert’ (and nice guy) and works with a number of large corporations here in the US and in the UK commenting on media trends and advising organizations on coping with rapid changes in the market place.
He started the session by asking members of the audience NOT to switch off their mobile phones, but to use them to text their responses to an instant SMS poll which was projected onto the screen in real time. The poll covered current issues that might be of most concern to the stock licensing business. However the point of the exercise was not really about the outcome measured onscreen, but more about the current use of interactive technology.
This is the way we can expect to operate in the future: very speedily and using communication methods which might not be familiar to all of us. One statistic, which surprised, was that there are supposedly more text messages sent each day around the globe than the number of people alive. No wonder our childrens’ phone bills are so high.
In a whirlwind of a speech, made while moving constantly around the stage, Jim took us through the 7 key issues he believes we need to focus on to stay not just in the game, but ahead of the pack, at a time when not only is technology moving fast, but product cycles are getting shorter and shorter as customer demands increase.
Jim claims to be hugely optimistic about the state of the world, having witnessed three or four previous recessions. He figures that this one may be over quicker than we might have imagined. That would be nice.
He also pointed out that while ten years ago there might have been a few thousand buyers of images worldwide there are now potentially 3 billion users. So there is cause for us to feel optimistic too. Well, I will–if we can get this great new potential market to understand that images actually belong to creators and that ‘copyright’ doesn’t really mean it’s ‘right to copy’ (editorial aside).
A few observations Jim made which were interesting to hear:
- 65% of current preschoolers will work in jobs that do not exist today.
- Scientific and technical evolution is moving at such a pace that half of what graduate students learn at university in their first year will have changed by the time they graduate.
- Product life cycles are being radically shortened.
What do innovators need to do to stay ahead of fast-paced events? Jim gave us 7 (actually 8) ideas which we need to consider in order to meet the challenge of the future:
- Focus on growth and opportunity: Listen to your customers and respond to what they want
- Think Transformation: New business models, democratization of stock, new concepts, review trends in lifestyles
- Check your speed: Am I operating at the speed of the market?
- Immerse in fast ideas: Challenge the fundamental thinking that slows you down
- Think upside-down: Get the assortment right, configure the merchandise, then market it
- Get out in front: Value your quality relationships and work with your clients.
- Focus on your strengths: Be a Master of Knowledge. Experiential capital is as important as financial capital
And BANISH the innovation killers in your company who tell you it can never be done, it won’t work, and you are crazy.
Noted the executive director of PACA in a followup message: “Thanks so much for an excellent presentation! We are already talking about having you return in a couple of years to re-access what has happened in our industry……. I’m happy to give a rave review to anyone who is considering your services.”
Think opportunity. Think growth!
When Do You Innovate?
Another clip from a recent keynote in Las Vegas.
Quite a few global organizations are bringing me in these days to inspire their leadership team to stay focused on growth, opportunity, and innovation.
In this clip, I talk about these issues, and put some perspective on dealing with challenging economic times.
Reinventing brand relevance
Here’s a clip from a recent keynote in Las Vegas.
I’m challenging the audience to think about the issue of maintaining brand relevance, in the era in which customers increasingly influence the perception of brands through social networking tools.
The key challenge today is preventing a brand from becoming “from the olden days.” I emphasize this with a quote from Multichannel Marketing, April 2008.
“In some ways, brands are like people. They get stuck. They have habits that are hard to break. They don’t always see their blind spots, and they lost touch with their core essence. They resist change. They become irrelevant“
Innovative organizations realize that they need to continuously address the issue of the relevance of their brands, and must work harder than before to keep them “fresh.”
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