Tag Archives: future

Why Photonic Processors are the Nervous System of the Future

Illumination as Innovation

LAST UPDATED: January 2, 2026 at 4:59 PM

Why Photonic Processors are the Nervous System of the Future

GUEST POST from Art Inteligencia

In the landscape of 2026, we have reached a critical juncture in what I call the Future Present (which you can also think as the close-in future). Our collective appetite for intelligence — specifically the generative, agentic, and predictive kind — has outpaced the physical capabilities of our silicon ancestors. For decades, we have relied on electrons to do our bidding, pushing them through increasingly narrow copper gates. But electrons have a weight, a heat, and a resistance that is now leading us directly into the Efficiency Trap. If we want to move from change to change with impact, we must change the medium of the message itself.

Enter Photonic Processing. This is not merely an incremental speed boost; it is a fundamental shift from the movement of matter to the movement of light. By using photons instead of electrons to perform calculations, we are moving toward a world of near-zero latency and drastically reduced energy consumption. As a specialist in Human-Centered Innovation™, I see this not just as a hardware upgrade, but as a breakthrough for human potential. When computing becomes as fast as thought and as sustainable as sunlight, the barriers between human intent and innovative execution finally begin to dissolve.

“Innovation is not just about moving faster; it is about illuminating the paths that were previously hidden by the friction of our limitations. Photonic computing is the lighthouse that allows us to navigate the vast oceans of data without burning the world to power the voyage.” — Braden Kelley

The End of the Electronic Friction

The core problem with traditional electronic processors is heat. When you move electrons through silicon, they collide, generating thermal energy. This is why data centers now consume a staggering percentage of the world’s electricity. Photons, however, do not have a charge and essentially do not interact with each other in the same way. They can pass through one another, move at the speed of light, and carry data across vast “optical highways” without the parasitic energy loss that plagues copper wiring.

For the modern organization, this means computational abundance. We can finally train the massive models required for true Human-AI Teaming without the ethical burden of a massive carbon footprint. We can move from “batch processing” our insights to “living insights” that evolve at the speed of human conversation.

Case Study 1: Transforming Real-Time Healthcare Diagnostics

The Challenge: A global genomic research institute in early 2025 was struggling with the “analysis lag.” To provide personalized cancer treatment plans, they needed to sequence and analyze terabytes of data in minutes. Using traditional GPU clusters, the process took days and cost thousands of dollars in energy alone.

The Photonic Solution: By integrating a hybrid photonic-electronic accelerator, the institute was able to perform complex matrix multiplications — the backbone of genomic analysis — using light. The impact? Analysis time dropped from 48 hours to 12 minutes. More importantly, the system consumed 90% less power. This allowed doctors to provide life-saving prescriptions while the patient was still in the clinic, transforming a diagnostic process into a human-centered healing experience.

Case Study 2: Autonomous Urban Flow in Smart Cities

The Challenge: A metropolitan pilot program for autonomous traffic management found that traditional electronic sensors were too slow to handle “edge cases” in dense fog and heavy rain. The latency of sending data to the cloud and back created a safety gap that the corporate antibody of public skepticism used to shut down the project.

The Photonic Solution: The city deployed “Optical Edge” processors at major intersections. These photonic chips processed visual data at the speed of light, identifying potential collisions before a human eye or an electronic sensor could even register the movement. The impact? A 60% reduction in traffic incidents and a 20% increase in average transit speed. By removing the latency, they restored public trust — the ultimate currency of Human-Centered Innovation™.

Leading Companies and Startups to Watch

The race to light-speed computing is no longer a laboratory experiment. Lightmatter is currently leading the pack with its Envise and Passage platforms, which provide a bridge between traditional silicon and the photonic future. Celestial AI is making waves with their “Photonic Fabric,” a technology designed to solve the massive data-bottleneck in AI clusters. We must also watch Ayar Labs, whose optical I/O chiplets are being integrated by giants like Intel to replace copper connections with light. Finally, Luminous Computing is quietly building a “supercomputer on a chip” that promises to bring the power of a data center to a desktop-sized device, truly democratizing the useful seeds of invention.

Designing for the Speed of Light

As we integrate these photonic systems, we must be careful not to fall into the Efficiency Trap. Just because we can process data a thousand times faster doesn’t mean we should automate away the human element. The goal of photonic innovation should be to free us from “grunt work” — the heavy lifting of data processing — so we can focus on “soul work” — the empathy, ethics, and creative leaps that no processor, no matter how fast, can replicate.

If you are an innovation speaker or a leader guiding your team through this transition, remember that technology is a tool, but trust is the architect. We use light to see more clearly, not to move so fast that we lose sight of our purpose. The photonic age is here; let us use it to build a future that is as bright as the medium it is built upon.

Frequently Asked Questions

What is a Photonic Processor?

A photonic processor is a type of computer chip that uses light (photons) instead of electricity (electrons) to perform calculations and transmit data. This allows for significantly higher speeds, lower latency, and dramatically reduced energy consumption compared to traditional silicon chips.

Why does photonic computing matter for AI?

AI models rely on massive “matrix multiplications.” Photonic chips can perform these specific mathematical operations using light interference patterns at the speed of light, making them ideally suited for the next generation of Large Language Models and autonomous systems.

Is photonic computing environmentally friendly?

Yes. Because photons do not generate heat through resistance like electrons do, photonic processors require far less cooling and electricity. This makes them a key technology for sustainable innovation and reducing the carbon footprint of global data centers.

Disclaimer: This article speculates on the potential future applications of cutting-edge scientific research. While based on current scientific understanding, the practical realization of these concepts may vary in timeline and feasibility and are subject to ongoing research and development.

Image credits: Google Gemini

Sign up here to get Human-Centered Change & Innovation Weekly delivered to your inbox every week.

The Future of Humanity in an Artificially Intelligent World

Leave a reply

The Future of Humanity in an Artificially Intelligent World

GUEST POST from Greg Satell

The Argentinian writer Jorge Borges had a fascination with a concept known as the infinite monkey theorem. The idea is that if you had an infinite amount of monkeys pecking away at an infinite amount of typewriters, they would randomly create the collected works of Tolstoy and every other masterwork ever written (or that could be written).

The theorem, which has been around for at least a century, is troubling because it calls into question what it means to be human. If we can be inspired by something that could so easily be randomly generated, then what does it mean to be meaningful? Is meaning just an illusion we construct to make ourselves happy?

In recent years, the rise of artificial intelligence has transformed this theoretical dilemma into an intensely practical issue. In a world in which machines are taking over work long thought of as intensely human, what is the role of human labor? How do we create value that is distinct from what machines can do faster and cheaper? The answers will shape our future.

Machines Replacing Humans

The first industrial robot, called Unimate, was installed on an assembly line at General Motors in 1961. Since then, robots have become highly integrated into our economy. They do dangerous jobs, like bomb disposal, as well as more prosaic ones, like running warehouses and legal discovery.

And lest you think that automation only applies to low-skill, mechanical jobs, robots are also invading the creative realm. One book written by a machine was even accepted as a submission for the prestigious Hoshi Shinichi Literary Award in Japan. There are now robots that advise physicians, movie producers and music executives. Some even write songs.

Yet these things have been, for the most part, going on in the background. Very few of us see robots at work in factories, much less evaluating scripts, reading mammograms or doing research for lawyers. However, the introduction of ChatGPT brings the power of AI to anyone with an Internet connection.

If you haven’t tried it yourself yet, here’s an example: I asked it to explain the infinite monkey theorem to me and this is what I got:

The infinite monkey theorem states that a monkey hitting keys at random on a typewriter keyboard for an infinite amount of time will almost surely type any given text, such as the complete works of William Shakespeare. The theorem is often used as a humorous illustration of the basics of probability theory. However, the theorem is actually a misnomer, since the chances of a monkey randomly typing a meaningful sequence of characters is incredibly small, and the concept of an “infinite” amount of time is physically impossible.

And just for fun, I asked it to produce a one paragraph promotional biography of Greg Satell:

Greg Satell is a thought leader in innovation and business strategy, with over 20 years of experience in the industry. He is a popular speaker and author, known for his bestselling book “Mapping Innovation: A Playbook for Navigating a Disruptive Age.” Greg has also held executive roles at leading companies and has a track record of driving innovation and growth through effective business strategies.

Each of these responses appeared in seconds and, while they are not what I would have chosen to write myself, they are more than passable. With the technology advancing at this pace, how can we compete with the machines?

The Automation Paradox

In 1900, 30 million people in the United States were farmers, but by 1990 that number had fallen to under 3 million even as the population more than tripled. So, in a manner of speaking, 90% of American agriculture workers lost their jobs due to automation. Yet those out-of-work farmers weren’t impoverished. In fact, the 20th century was an era of unprecedented prosperity.

Consider this: Although the workforce in the US has more than doubled since 1950, labor participation rates remain close to all-time highs. Still, a recent report by the US Chamber of Commerce found that we have a massive labor shortage. In the highly-automated manufacturing sector, it estimated that even if every unemployed person with experience were employed, it would only fill half of the vacant jobs.

In fact, when you look at highly automated fields, they tend to be the ones that have major labor shortages. You see touchscreens everywhere you go, but 70% of openings in the retail sector go unfilled. Autopilot has been around for decades, but we face a massive global pilot shortage that’s getting worse every year.

Once a task becomes automated, it also becomes largely commoditized and value is then created in an area that wasn’t quite obvious when people were busy doing more basic things. Go to an Apple store and you’ll notice two things: lots of automation and a sea of employees in blue shirts there to help, troubleshoot and explain things to you. Value doesn’t disappear, it just shifts to a different place.

One striking example of this is the humble community bookstore. With the domination of Amazon, you might think that small independent bookstores would be doomed, but instead they’re thriving. While its true that they can’t match Amazon’s convenience, selection or prices, people are flocking to small local shops for other reasons, such as deep expertise in particular subject matter and the chance to meet people with similar interests.

The Irrational Mind

To understand where value is shifting now, the work of neuroscientist Antonio Damasio can shed some light. He studied patients who, despite having perfectly normal cognitive ability, had lost the ability to feel emotion. Many would assume that, without emotions to distract them, these people would be great at making perfectly rational decisions.

But they weren’t. In fact, they couldn’t make any decisions at all. They could list the factors at play and explain their significance, but they couldn’t feel one way or another about them. In effect, without emotion they couldn’t form any intention. One decision was just like any other, leading to an outcome that they cared nothing about.

The social psychologist Jonathan Haidt built on Damasio’s work to form his theory of social intuitionism. What Haidt found in his research is that we don’t make moral judgments through conscious reasoning, but rather through unconscious intuition. Essentially, we automatically feel a certain way about something and then come up with reasons that we should feel that way.

Once you realize that, it becomes clear why Apple needs so many blue shirts at its stores and why independent bookstores are thriving. An artificial intelligence can access all the information in the world, curate that information and present it to us in an understandable way, but it can’t understand why we should care about it.

In fact, humans often disguise our true intent, even to ourselves. A student might say he wants a new computer to do schoolwork, but may really want a stronger graphics engine to play video games. In much the same way, a person may want to buy a book about a certain subject, but also truly covet a community which shares the same interest.

The Library of Babel And The Intention Economy

In his story The Library of Babel, Borges describes a library which contains books with all potential word combinations in all possible languages. Such a place would encompass all possible knowledge, but would also be completely useless, because the vast majority of books would be gibberish consisting of random strings of symbols.

In essence, deriving meaning would be an exercise in curation, which machines could do if they perfectly understood our intentions. However, human motives are almost hopelessly complex. So much so, in fact, that even we ourselves often have difficulty understanding why we want one thing and not another.

There are some things that a computer will never do. Machines will never strike out at a Little League game, have their hearts broken in a summer romance or see their children born. The inability to share human experiences makes it difficult, if not impossible, for computers to relate to human emotions and infer how those feelings shape preferences in a given context.

That’s why the rise of artificial intelligence is driving a shift from cognitive to social skills. The high paying jobs today have less to do with the ability to retain facts or manipulate numbers—we now use computers for those things—than it does with humans serving other humans. That requires more deep collaboration, teamwork and emotional intelligence.

To derive meaning in an artificially intelligent world we need to look to each other and how we can better understand our intentions. The future of technology is always more human.

HALLOWEEN BONUS: Save 30% on the eBook, hardcover or softcover of Braden Kelley’s latest book Charting Change (now in its second edition) — FREE SHIPPING WORLDWIDE — using code HAL30 until midnight October 31, 2025

— Article courtesy of the Digital Tonto blog
— Image credit: Gemini

Sign up here to join 17,000+ leaders getting Human-Centered Change & Innovation Weekly delivered to their inbox every week.

4 Simple Steps to Becoming Your Own Futurist

1 Reply

An Introduction to the FutureHacking™ methodology

FutureHacking Foresight and Futurist Primer

by Braden Kelley

The starting point for becoming your own futurist is of course to first understand what futurology (or a futurist) is. Then we must also understand what strategic and market foresight are as well.

What is Futurology (or a Futurist)?

Futures studies, futures research, futurism or futurology is the systematic, interdisciplinary and holistic study of social and technological advancement, and other environmental trends, often for the purpose of exploring how people will live and work in the future. Predictive techniques, such as forecasting, can be applied, but contemporary futures studies scholars emphasize the importance of systematically exploring alternatives.

Source: Wikipedia

What are Strategic and Market Foresight?

Strategic Foresight is about combining methods of futures work with those of strategic management. It is about understanding upcoming external changes in relation to internal capabilities and drivers.
Market Foresight is about the consideration of possible and probable futures in the organization’s relevant business environment, and about identifying new opportunities in that space.

Source: Aalto University

Now we are ready to look at the four simple, but powerful steps to becoming your own futurist using the FutureHacking™ methodology:

STEP ONE: Picking the Signals That Matter

FutureSignals™ Radar & NowBuilder™ Canvas

Identify up to the eight most critical signals to monitor or amplify in order to look back, reach an innovation goal, describe them and capture for each signal what the status quo, small change and big change scenarios might look like – and which scenario is most likely.

STEP TWO: Mapping Signal Evolution

FutureSignals™ Radar Summary & Tracking

Summarize the most likely scenarios for up to the eight most critical signals along with their descriptions and whether you plan to monitor or amplify each. Use a tracking sheet to record changes in the signal over time – revisit and re-prioritize as needed.

STEP THREE: Choosing the Possible, Probable and Preferable Future

FutureCanvas™ & Picker (macro view)

Leveraging your FutureSignals™ summary, create a headline for an imagined future. Then capture the problems that have been solved, how society has changed, the new problems that may now exist and what we must do to shape the future. Rinse and Repeat.

STEP FOUR: Making Your Preferable Future a Reality

FutureSignals™ & FutureCanvas™ Action Plans (micro)

Leveraging your FutureSignals™ summary, create a headline for an imagined future. Then capture the key signals related to this headline, how the customer is changing and how the company must change in response.

These four simple steps to becoming your own futurist are accelerated by adopting the 20 new tools of the Futurehacking™ methodology that I have created.

“FutureHacking™ is the art and science of getting to the future first.”

It’s a methodology I’ve created that contains a suite of simple, but powerful tools at its core that will enable you to be your own futurist.

FutureHacking™ is designed to make foresight and futurology accessible to the average business professional.

Prototyping the Future

FutureHacking™ is a revolutionary approach that empowers cross-functional leadership teams to visually prototype the future and collaboratively create the roadmap and guideposts for manifesting your preferred, possible future.

FutureHacking Tool Collection

Why is Investing in Futures Research (or a Futurist) important?

Every stakeholder-responsible organization is compelled to realize its vision, execute its strategy, and achieve its goals – indefinitely. But, the future is uncertain. We cannot extrapolate that what has made an organization successful this year or last year will make it succeed in future years. Responsible organizations must invest in understanding the possible futures and realizing their preferable future. FutureHacking™ makes this investment much easier, cheaper and faster – helping you get to the future first.

“FutureHacking™ tools help you facilitate the future.”

Click the image to download a PDF flipbook:

Two Ways to Join the FutureHacking™ Ecosystem

Data and trend research partners to create service offerings as an input into the FutureSignals™ component
Futurists, consulting partners, and technology providers (interactive whiteboarding, etc.) to get FutureHacking™ certified and profit from the delivery of services to help people leverage the FutureSignals™, NowBuilder™ and FutureCanvas™ tools

One Way to Connect and Succeed

Contact me if you think you have a compelling partnership value proposition and subscribe to my newsletter below to find out when the certification program and facilitated off-site offerings are launched!

Image credit: Pixabay

Sign up here to get Human-Centered Change & Innovation Weekly delivered to your inbox every week.

Top 10 Human-Centered Change & Innovation Articles of December 2023

Leave a reply

Top 10 Human-Centered Change & Innovation Articles of December 2023 Drum roll please…

At the beginning of each month, we will profile the ten articles from the previous month that generated the most traffic to Human-Centered Change & Innovation. Did your favorite make the cut?

But enough delay, here are December’s ten most popular innovation posts:

Five Key Digital Transformation Barriers — by Howard Tiersky
Achieving a Transformation Vision for a Better Future — by Howard Tiersky
Eight Innovation Executive Types — by Stefan Lindegaard
Skills versus Judgement — by Mike Shipulski
We Need to Stop Glorifying Failure — by Greg Satell
What Will People See? — by Mike Shipulski
Don’t Waste Your Time Talking to Customers — by Robyn Bolton
The Amazing Efficiency of Systematic Guessing — by Dennis Stauffer
Four Change Empowerment Myths — by Greg Satell
Do the Right Thing — by Mike Shipulski

BONUS – Here are five more strong articles published in November that continue to resonate with people:

Four Growth Mindset Myths — by Stefan Lindegaard
Reinventing the Retail Store — by Howard Tiersky
Mental Orgasm – The Joy of Discovery — by Dennis Stauffer
CEO Secrets of a Successful Turnaround — by Shep Hyken
Competing Successfully in an Ecosystem World — by Greg Satell

If you’re not familiar with Human-Centered Change & Innovation, we publish 4-7 new articles every week built around innovation and transformation insights from our roster of contributing authors and ad hoc submissions from community members. Get the articles right in your Facebook, Twitter or Linkedin feeds too!

Have something to contribute?

Human-Centered Change & Innovation is open to contributions from any and all innovation and transformation professionals out there (practitioners, professors, researchers, consultants, authors, etc.) who have valuable human-centered change and innovation insights to share with everyone for the greater good. If you’d like to contribute, please contact me.

P.S. Here are our Top 40 Innovation Bloggers lists from the last four years:

Sign up here to get Human-Centered Change & Innovation Weekly delivered to your inbox every week.

What’s Next?

Leave a reply

What's Next?

GUEST POST from Mike Shipulski

Anonymous: What do you think we should do next?

Me: It depends. How did you get here?

Anonymous: Well, we’ve had great success improving on what we did last time.

Me: Well, then you’ll likely do that again.

Anonymous: Do you think we’ll be successful this time?

Me: It depends. If the performance/goodness has been flat over your last offerings, then no. When performance has been constant over the last several offerings it means your technology is mature and it’s time for a new one. Has performance been flat over the years?

Anon: Yes, but we’ve been successful with our tried-and-true recipe and the idea of creating a new technology is risky.

Me: All things have a half-life, including successful business models and long-in-the-tooth technologies, and your success has blinded you to the fact that yours are on life support. Developing a new technology isn’t risky. What’s risk is grasping tightly to a business model that’s out of gas.

Anon: That’s harsh.

Me: I prefer “truthful.”

Anon: So, we should start from scratch and create something altogether new?

Me: Heavens no. That would be a disaster. Figure out which elements are blocking new functionality and reinvent those. Hint: look for the system elements that haven’t changed in a dog’s age and that are shared by all your competitors.

Anon: So, I only have to reinvent several elements?

Me: Yes, but probably fewer than several. Probably just one.

Anon: What if we don’t do that?

Me: Over the next five years, you’ll be successful. And then in year six, the wheels will fall off.

Anon: Are you sure?

Me: No, they could fall off sooner.

Anon: How do you know it will go down like that?

Me: I’ve studied systems and technologies for more than three decades and I’ve made a lot of mistakes. Have you heard of The Voice of Technology?

Anon: No.

Me: Well, take a bite of this – The Voice of Technology. Kevin Kelly has talked about this stuff at great length. Have you read him?

Anon: No.

Me: Here’s a beauty from Kevin – What Technology Wants. How about S-curves?

Anon: Nope.

Me: Here’s a little primer – Beyond Dead Reckoning. How about Technology Forecasting?

Anon: Hmm. I don’t think so.

Me: Here’s something from Victor Fey, my teacher. He worked with Altshuller, the creator of TRIZ – Guided Technology Evolution. I’ve used this method to predict several industry-changing technologies.

Anon: Yikes! There’s a lot here. I’m overwhelmed.

Me: That’s good! Overwhelmed is a sign you realize there’s a lot you don’t know. You could be ready to become a student of the game.

Anon: But where do I start?

Me: I’d start Wardley Maps for situation analysis and LEANSTACK to figure out if customers will pay for your new offering.

Anon: With those two I’m good to go?

Me: Hell no!

Anon: What do you mean?

Me: There’s a whole body of work to learn about. Then you’ve got to build the organization, create the right mindset, select the right projects, train on the right tools, and run the projects.

Anon: That sounds like a lot of work.

Me: Well, you can always do what you did last time. END.

Image credit: Unsplash

Sign up here to join 17,000+ leaders getting Human-Centered Change & Innovation Weekly delivered to their inbox every week.

The Impact of Artificial Intelligence on Future Employment

Leave a reply

The Impact of Artificial Intelligence on Future Employment

GUEST POST from Chateau G Pato

The rapid progression of artificial intelligence (AI) has ignited both intrigue and fear among experts in various industries. While the advancements in AI hold promises of improved efficiency, increased productivity, and innumerable benefits, concerns have been raised about the potential impact on employment. As AI technology continues to evolve and permeate into different sectors, it is crucial to examine the implications it may have on the workforce. This article will delve into the impact of AI on future employment, exploring two case study examples that shed light on the subject.

Case Study 1: Autonomous Vehicles

One area where AI has gained significant traction in recent years is autonomous vehicles. While self-driving cars promise to revolutionize transportation, they also pose a potential threat to traditional driving jobs. According to a study conducted by the University of California, Berkeley, an estimated 300,000 truck driving jobs could be at risk in the coming decades due to the rise of autonomous vehicles.

Although this projection may seem alarming, it is important to note that AI-driven automation can also create new job opportunities. With the emergence of autonomous vehicles, positions such as remote monitoring operators, vehicle maintenance technicians, and safety supervisors are likely to be in demand. Additionally, the introduction of AI in this sector could also lead to the creation of entirely new industries such as ride-hailing services, data analysis, and infrastructure development related to autonomous vehicles. Therefore, while some jobs may be displaced, others will potentially emerge, resulting in a shift rather than a complete loss in employment opportunities.

Case Study 2: Healthcare and Diagnostics

The healthcare industry is another sector profoundly impacted by artificial intelligence. AI has already demonstrated remarkable prowess in diagnosing diseases and providing personalized treatment plans. For instance, IBM’s Watson, a cognitive computing system, has proved capable of analyzing vast amounts of medical literature and patient data to assist physicians in making more accurate diagnoses.

While AI undoubtedly enhances healthcare outcomes, concerns arise regarding the future of certain medical professions. Radiologists, for example, who primarily interpret medical images, may face challenges as AI algorithms become increasingly proficient at detecting abnormalities. A study published in Nature in 2020 revealed that AI could outperform human radiologists in interpreting mammograms. As AI is more widely incorporated into the healthcare system, the role of radiologists may evolve to focus on higher-level tasks such as treatment decisions, patient consultation, and research.

Moreover, the integration of AI into healthcare offers new employment avenues. The demand for data scientists, AI engineers, and software developers specialized in healthcare will likely increase. Additionally, healthcare professionals with expertise in data analysis and managing AI systems will be in high demand. As AI continues to transform the healthcare industry, the focus should be on retraining and up-skilling to ensure a smooth transition for affected employees.

Conclusion

The impact of artificial intelligence on future employment is a complex subject with both opportunities and challenges. While certain job roles may face disruption, AI also creates the potential for new roles to emerge. The cases of autonomous vehicles and AI in healthcare provide compelling examples of how the workforce can adapt and evolve alongside technology. Preparing for this transition will require a concerted effort from policymakers, employers, and individuals to ensure a smooth integration of AI into the workplace while safeguarding the interests of employees.

Extra Extra: Because innovation is all about change, Braden Kelley’s human-centered change methodology and tools are the best way to plan and execute the changes necessary to support your innovation and transformation efforts — all while literally getting everyone all on the same page for change. Find out more about the methodology and tools, including the book Charting Change by following the link. Be sure and download the TEN FREE TOOLS while you’re here.

Image credit: Pexels

Sign up here to get Human-Centered Change & Innovation Weekly delivered to your inbox every week.

Latest Interview with the Future Forward Podcast

Leave a reply

I recently had the opportunity to sit down with Teresa Spangler of The Future Forward Podcast, about my work as a community builder, workshop facilitator, and thought leader on the topics of human-centered change and innovation, and some of my work with clients to create delightful customer and employees experiences, digital transformation, foresight, and innovation strategies.

But mostly in this information-packed interview, I reveal key lessons I learned along the way about how to recognize and make the most of opportunities, to make change happen, and to ultimately make a difference.

Some of the elements of the conversation came from things I discuss in my latest book Charting Change and its associated Change Planning Toolkit™. Both introduce a powerful visual, collaborative approach to human-centered change and transformation.

But we also spoke about imagination, artificial intelligence, world building, foresight and futures research.

Here is the YouTube version of my visit with the Future Forward podcast:

But, it is also available in most other places where quality podcasts are found:

If you’d like to sign up to learn more about my new FutureHacking™ methodology and set of tools, go here.

Accelerate your change and transformation success

Sign up here to get Human-Centered Change & Innovation Weekly delivered to your inbox every week.

3 Examples of Why Innovation is a Leadership Problem

6 Replies

Through the Looking Glass

3 Examples of Why Innovation is a Leadership Problem

GUEST POST from Robyn Bolton

Do you sometimes feel like you’re living in an alternate reality?

If so, you’re not alone. Most innovators feel that way at some point.

After all, you see things that others don’t.

Question things that seem inevitable and true.

Make connections where others only see differences.

Do things that seem impossible.

It’s easy to believe that you’re the crazy one, the Mad Hatter and permanent resident of Wonderland.

But what if you’re not the crazy one?

What if you’re Alice?

And you’re stepping through the looking glass every time you go to work?

In Lewis Carroll’s book, the other side of the looking glass is a chessboard, and all its inhabitants are chess pieces that move in defined and prescribed ways, follow specific rules, and achieve defined goals. Sound familiar?

Here are a few other things that may sound familiar, too

“The rule is, jam tomorrow and jam yesterday – but never jam today.” – The White Queen

In this scene, the White Queen offers to hire Alice as her lady’s maid and pay her “twopence a week and jam every other day.” When Alice explains that she doesn’t want the job, doesn’t like jam, and certainly doesn’t want jam today, the queen scoffs and explains the rule.

The problem, Alice points out, is that it’s always today, and that means there’s never jam.

Replace “jam” with “innovation,” and this hits a little too close to home for most innovators.

How often do you hear about the “good old days” when the company was more entrepreneurial, willing to experiment and take risks, and encouraged everyone to innovate?

Innovation yesterday.

How often do you hear that the company will invest in innovation, restart its radical innovation efforts, and disrupt itself as soon as the economy rebounds, business improves, and things settle down a bit? Innovation tomorrow.

But never innovation today. After all, “it’s [innovation] every other day: today isn’t any other day, you know.”

“When I use a word, it means just what I choose it to mean – neither more, not less.” – Humpty Dumpty

In this scene, poor Alice tries to converse with Humpty Dumpty, but he keeps using the “wrong” words. Except they’re not the wrong words because they mean exactly what he chooses them to mean.

Even worse, when Alice asks Humpty to define confusing terms, he gets angry, speaks in a “scornful tone,” and smiles “contemptuously” before “wagging his head gravely from side to side.

We all know what the words we use mean, but we too often think others share our definitions. We use “innovation” and “growth,” assuming people know what we mean. But they don’t. They know what the words mean to them. And that may or may not be what we mean.

When managers encourage people to share ideas, challenge the status quo, and take risks, things get even trickier. People listen, share ideas, challenge the status quo, and take risks. Then they are confused when management doesn’t acknowledge their efforts. No one realizes that those requests meant one thing to the managers who gave them and a different thing to the people who did them.

“It takes all the running you can do, to keep in the same place. If you want to go somewhere else, you must run at least twice as fast as that!” – The Red Queen

In this scene, the Red Queen introduces life on the other side of the looking glass and explains Alice’s new role as a pawn. Of course, the explanation comes after a long sprint that seems to get them nowhere and only confuses Alice more.

When “tomorrow” finally comes, and it’s time for innovation, it often comes with a mandate to “act with urgency” to avoid falling behind. I’ve seen managers set goals of creating and launching a business with $250M revenue in 3 years and leadership teams scrambling to develop a portfolio of businesses that would generate $16B in 10 years.

Yes, the world is moving faster, so companies need to increase the pace at which they operate and innovate. But if you’re doing all you can, you can’t do twice as much. You need help – more people and more funding, not more meetings or oversight.

“Life, what is it but a dream?”

Managers and executives, like the kings and queens, have roles to play. They live in a defined space, an org chart rather than a chessboard, and they do their best to navigate it following rules set by tradition, culture, and HR.

But you are like Alice. You see things differently. You question what’s taken as given. And, every now and then, you probably want to shake someone until they grow “shorter – and fatter – and softer – and rounder – and…[into] a kitten, after all.”

So how do you get back to reality and bring everyone with you? You talk to people. You ask questions and listen to the answers. You seek to understand their point of view and then share yours.

Some will choose to stay where they are.

Some will choose to follow you back through the looking glass.

They will be the ones who transform a leadership problem into a leadership triumph.

Image credits: Pixabay

Sign up here to join 17,000+ leaders getting Human-Centered Change & Innovation Weekly delivered to their inbox every week.

Get Ready for the Age of Acceleration

1 Reply

How Preparing to Climb Mt. Everest Can Help You

GUEST POST from Robert B. Tucker

The phone rang in geologist Doug Burbank’s office at the University of Southern California. A climbing buddy was calling to ask if he wanted to join an expedition that was shortly to climb Everest. Impulsively, even though he had a full teaching schedule, a wife, and two young daughters, Doug said, “Count me in.”

What Doug did next to prepare for the adventure of a lifetime will amaze you. It’s a story I’ll share at the Pacific Coast Futures Retreat on May 2nd, in Santa Barbara, and it will help you deal with the uncertainty and volatility of the Age of Acceleration and constant disruption just ahead.

Doug realized that, living in Los Angeles, frost is rare. His body was not ready. He began researching the question: “How do I prepare my body to live in subzero temperatures day after day?” Add to this challenge the fact that Doug suffers from acrophobia – fear of heights. He needed to mitigate this potentially immobilizing condition – and fast! Doug’s innovative solutions will surprise you (e.g. “Put your hands in a bucket of ice water for ten minutes a day for two weeks to acclimate the body,” etc.).

Doug Burbank’s strategies have great relevance to the Everest before all of us: how to prepare for a world where the rate of change is increasingly exponential and never before experienced in human history?

In virtually every realm of our lives, the forecast is one of increased volatility and uncertainty. From energy to A.I. to unbridled technology. From medical breakthroughs to social media, to the rapidly warming climate. These forces will disrupt millions who are not prepared. They will create new winners and losers. They will influence markets. They will drive consumer and voter and social behavior. And they will challenge us as never before to look and think ahead of the curve, to mine the lessons of history, to unleash human agency and vision to shape the future we want rather than the one we inherit by default.

Over the next ten years, there will be more change than over the past 100 years. The divide will grow between those who “get it” and those who don’t. Between those who watch changes envelop them and toss them around and those who take calculated risks to create their own reality.

My friend Doug Burbank knows the secrets of how to adapt to new environments and come out alive. The Pacific Coast Futures Retreat will be a day of learning and discussion about the overdrive future. At this powerful, one-day gathering of forward thinkers from the world of business, academia, government, and the non-profit sector, the focus will be on understanding and mapping the emerging terrain. We will master the necessary “navigational skills” that will alert us to threats and unleash the creativity to discover and seize the opportunities that change brings about.

If you want to develop new navigational mindsets that will enable you to thrive and prosper no matter what shape the future takes, and if you seek to become indispensable to your organization, family, community and to play an outsized role in shaping the future for the common good, please join us by registering here.

Image credits: Robert B. Tucker, Doug Burbank

Sign up here to join 17,000+ leaders getting Human-Centered Change & Innovation Weekly delivered to their inbox every week.

A Different Approach to Well-being, Resilience and Creativity

2 Replies

A Different Approach to Well-being, Resilience and Creativity

GUEST POST from Janet Sernack

In our previous blogs, we outlined the need, in our chaotic world of unknowns, to reclaim our focus and attention and take charge of our own minds. By reclaiming these, and enhancing self-awareness we have a deeper understanding of the sources of our anxiety and distractions. How to self-manage and self-regulate them through developing deliberate calm. To effectively create consciousness, and a safe space that potentially transforms the power of our minds and hearts to connect with others, cultivate well-being, harness people’s collective genius, and generate our resilience, through thinking about creativity differently.

Transforming fear and alarm

This mobilizes the energy our fears, anxiety, and alarm provide to transform the power of our minds and develop physical and psychological well-being. We can then apply proven neuroscience principles and coaching practices to cultivate resilience and think about creativity differently.

Transforming our fears and alarm in this way increases our resilience in responding to events in real-time, anticipating future events, and processing learning’s post events. It also enhances our well-being and creativity to enable us to be courageous and compassionate when inventing and innovating in an uncertain and constantly changing environment.

The potential outcomes include people experiencing more positive emotions, increased engagement at work, increased development of positive relationships, and more meaningful and purposeful work. These help us be adaptive, and transform the power of our hearts and minds to be creative, accomplish, learn, adapt, grow, and innovate through disruption.

Well-being is in crisis

In the latest report, by Udemy on “Workplace Learning Trends” they compare data collected from Australian workers (human capital) in early September 2022 with previous surveys in November 2019, August 2020, and May 2021.

They discovered three surprising truths about well-being, including:

Workers’ resilience levels are waning. More than two-thirds of workers (68.5%) felt like they were burning out at work. This is impacting workers’ levels of performance, job satisfaction, and commitment.
There is a crisis for meaningful work Only 39.1% of workers said their work was valuable and worthwhile, versus 47% in 2021, and 52.9% in 2020.
Many workplaces are wasting their well-being Workplaces have too much invested in EAP services (which are proving only slightly more effective than doing nothing) and not enough in more effective tools that workers are more comfortable accessing like Wellbeing Artificial Intelligence Bots, Wellbeing Apps, Wellbeing Workshops and Wellbeing Coaching.

This reinforces the need to think and act differently when we approach cultivating well-being, resilience, and creativity to better realize our human potential and human skills in times when they are our most valuable assets and needed the most and are crucial to future success!

Developing deliberate calm

“Deliberate calm” involves developing a practice of adaptive, intentional choices that anyone can develop by embracing what was once regarded as “soft” stuff: self-awareness, emotional intelligence, and mindfulness to learn proactively and lead dynamically amid the most uncertain circumstances, where according to Aaron De Smet, the co-author of “Deliberate Calm: How to Learn and Lead in a Volatile World”:

“Why do we say “deliberate”? Because if you’re not deliberate about it you will probably freak out. I need to be very deliberate in knowing that I’m in a chaotic situation, knowing the stakes are high, knowing there’s a lot of uncertainty, and then deliberately calming myself down and taking stock”.

Deliberate calm looks at the inner world, the outer world, the context, and the dynamic between those and starts by slowing down to create a safe space for people to enjoy the benefits of deliberate calm. This helps activate, focus, and unleash our creative brains and facilitates thinking about creativity differently.

Hitting our pause buttons

Creating deliberate calm is one of the most critically urgent human skill sets to develop.

It involves creating for ourselves and co-creating, with others, more normalized states of equilibrium and calmness. This enables us to cultivate our physical and psychological well-being, develop resilience and unleash creativity differently by accessing our collective intelligence, skills, and experience through applying proven neuroscience principles and coaching practices.

It starts with initiating a habit of pausing long enough to take deep breaths, retreat, reflect, and access these inner parts of ourselves; including noticing our emotions, identifying our triggers, observing our physical reactions to normalize our equilibrium, coherence, and calmness, and focusing on thinking about creativity differently.

Re-appraising our situation

We can then reappraise what is really going on, by identifying what our emotions are telling us, sustaining the most resourceful emotions and letting negative ones go, and finally, by identifying the key options for taking positive actions. Ultimately take smarter risks, make smarter decisions, and take more intelligent actions that cultivate our well-being, develop our resilience, unleash creativity differently, and satisfy our desire for meaning, purpose, and accomplishment.

As evidenced by our global coaching practice, this personally empowering and energizing activity focuses our attention, minds, and hearts on what really matters, and on what we can truly influence and control in a world of unknowns, and engages people deeply in doing the value-adding, productive and meaningful work that delivers it.

Three new deliberate calming practices to access and unleash our creative brains

Being grounded: involves being fully embodied, whole, centered, and balanced in ourselves and our relationships, we are in complete control of our mental, physical, and emotional selves, and are not easily influenced or shaken by other ideas or individuals.
Our unconscious mind, through our brains’ default mode network (DMN), is freed to wander, and be spontaneous in emerging and generating novel and surprising ideas and patterns.

This is usually achieved by regularly practicing a range of very simple activities that help us get centered, including removing any distractions (mobile phones), deep breathing (box breathing), and slow grounding repetitive exercises such as Feldenkrais.

Being mindful: involves focusing our conscious attention on the present moment, our physical sensations, thoughts, and emotions in an accepting, nonjudgmental, and discerning way. It involves training our unconscious minds to notice, focus and pay deep attention to what is really going on, for ourselves, for others, and in the system, we are operating within.
Our conscious minds are now provided with the focus necessary for guided problem-solving and for identifying the actions required to deliver the desired outcomes.

This is usually achieved by simple activities, by directing your focus when walking during the day (in nature without headsets), yoga, swimming, golf, tennis, listening to music, cooking, or by simple mindful meditation practices.

Being conscious: involves being in the present moment, or fully in the “here and now,” and means that we are grounded, fully aware, and mindful of what is happening at every moment because we are now consciously aware and able to shift our minds and generate creative thinking strategies.
Our conscious minds are able to exploit possibilities and make sense of the ideas that surface in the mind-wandering phase, by accessing the salience network, which then recruits the executive control networks, in our brains to refine and develop an idea. We can then exploit the range of creative ideas to make unexpected connections and to emerge, diverge and converge novel ideas for thinking about creativity differently, as well as for smart risk-taking, decision-making, and innovative problem-solving.

Empowering people to envision and transform

Creating a safe space, to transform the power of our minds and hearts to connect with others cultivates our well-being, harnesses peoples’ collective genius, generates resilience, and unleashes creativity by thinking about creativity differently.

This manifests as an opportunity to empower people to plan and make the nudges necessary to kickstart change, envision and plan for the future of unknowns.

Rather than unintentionally colluding with their unconscious panicking and retreating from the fears, anxiety, and risks currently emerging in an uncertain world full of disruption and crises.

Find out about our collective, learning products and tools, including The Coach for Innovators, Leaders, and Teams Certified Program, presented by Janet Sernack, is a collaborative, intimate, and deeply personalized innovation coaching and learning program, supported by a global group of peers over 9-weeks, starting Friday, May 12, 2023.

It is a blended and transformational change and learning program that will give you a deep understanding of the language, principles, and applications of an ecosystem focus, human-centric approach, and emergent structure (Theory U) to innovation, and upskill people and teams and develop their future fitness, within your unique innovation context.

Image Credit: Pixabay

Sign up here to join 17,000+ leaders getting Human-Centered Change & Innovation Weekly delivered to their inbox every week.