While I will rarely comment on current politics, I was moved and disappointed to see today’s “A Reversal on End-of-Life Planning. It is sad, troubling, fill-in-your-favorite descriptor to see that discussion around important future issues such as end-of-life planning has been effectively shut down. It reminded me of the roots of futures studies when Herman Kahn introduced scenario planning as a policy tool enabling the discussion of difficult issues, such as the various policy options for dealing with the possibility of nuclear annihilation, aka “thinking the unthinkable.” Today, it seems, rather than discuss difficult policy options, they are simply removed. Doubleplusbad. Andy Hines
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- Modern Values Bulldozing to the Future June 17, 2013The full spectrum of values seemed to be in play in China in reading the Sunday New York Times. The eye-popping story was the announcement that the government is planning to move 250 million people into cities. The bulldozers are coming to clear the road for progress. For some time now, the Chinese government has […]Andy Hines
- The 4 izations: Inevitabilities or Predetermineds to 2020 June 10, 2013I suggested four “inevitabilities” to 2020 in a recent talk on higher education. Fans of the GBN scenario approach may recall the sorting of drivers into predetermineds and uncertainties – so “predetermineds” would be their parlance. Key caveat is that this is for the affluent nations (W1 in my parlance). Granted, if they are inevitable, […]Andy Hines
- Panarchy, the Adaptive Cycle, and Change June 3, 2013I re-read Panarchy a while back and it’s even better the second time around! While I have pages of notes, thought I’d share three areas where it has influenced my practice. Revised our description of change. Fresh off teaching two week-long certificate courses, visions of change are dancing in my head. We introduce four aspects of […]Andy Hines
- An Insider’s Guide to Foresight Consulting at World Future Society May 29, 2013I’m very pleased to offer the 2nd annual “Insider’s Guide To Foresight Consulting” day-long workshop at the World Future Society General Assembly on Thursday July 18th in Chicago with my colleagues Riel Miller and Chris Carbone. This team should provide a real treat for audiences, as Riel and I did it ourselves last year and we’ve […]Andy Hines
- The Houston Futures Studies program is now “Foresight” May 27, 2013I am happy share that we’ve changed the name of the Futures Studies program to “Foresight.” Actually, the official name of the program at the main campus was “Futures Studies in Commerce.” Without going into details, we were not big fans of the “in commerce,” as it raised questions about whether we had changed the […]Andy Hines
- Within you or Without You: The “System” and the Future of Higher Education May 22, 2013I recently gave a talk on the future of higher education for “Technology Learning Conference” at the University of Houston-Downtown. Much of the material came from a project with a foundation exploring the future of higher education to provide context for developing a strategy for achieving its vision of significantly increasing the percentage of adults [... […]Andy Hines
- Foresight success? May 13, 2013I did a five-minute “Little Big” at the APF “Play” Gathering on May 3rd in Orlando. I called it “A Framework for Discussing Success.” The ideas emerged from dissertation and I am planning to write a journal article on it, but for now here are the main ideas. I reviewed the foresight literature to see […]Andy Hines
- 16 things that made me go hmmm at APF’s “Play” May 7, 2013Thought I’d share some musings from my experience at the APF “Play” gathering. Borrowing from the old C&C Factory song, here are 16 Things That Made Me Go Hmmm.(I’m not attributing as I don’t want to misquote anyone or get them in trouble) LVC for types of simulation: Live players – football practice; Virtual – people […]Andy Hines
- Reflections on the Future of Cities April 29, 2013The Houston Futures extended family gathered for a weekend of futures fun on April 12 and 13. While a key purpose is to give students, prospective students, alums, faculty and friends a chance to socialize and network in person, there was also plenty of good discussion about the future. The topic theme on “city making” […]Andy Hines
- Futurist: specialist or generalist? April 22, 2013A prospective student raised a question about specialization in foresight in a recent APF listserve conversation. This question is also a frequent one of our Houston Futures grad students. We discussed the question recently in Pro Seminar and did a ”personal branding” exercise to help us think through how we want to present ourselves to […]Andy Hines