When describing possible futures, storytelling is a powerful way to make that future real. I have the benefit of being surrounded by strong storytellers, some with great narrative skills and others with strong visualization skills. All of them possess that rare gift of taking complex topics and making them simple. In a world as complex and uncertain as ours, I highly value those skills. Short videos have proven to be a strong communication vehicle – and animated videos are even better. Our YouTube Channel has several animated examples. April Harris is a visualization specialist and colleague. She has been creating short videos to amplify messages from the various Blog Posts I produce – this one below supports my thoughts on Life After Coronavirus. Thank you, April, for the creative ways in which you support storytelling. The rest of the story tellers include: Bill Quinn, Kevin Mulcahy, Bill Bosak, Kevin Benedict, David Kish, Rose Rodriguez, and Neeraj Sharma. My thanks for your support in creating a dialog around our emerging future.
YouTube
From Sage On The Stage To Co-Creator Of Learning
20th century education was based on the assumption that the teachers have the answers and that their job is to impart those answers to the students, as the “sage on the stage.”
By contrast, 21st century education is, or should be, based on the assumption that the answers are already available in the digital world. The purpose of education should be to inspire the students to ask the right questions and discover those answers for themselves and start applying the answers in their own lives
Steve Denning
That quote says it all and this short video captures the thinking from an earlier post on an Education Revolution. A number of interviews with educators can be found at the Reimagining the Future YouTube Channel.
We Live In A New Era – Our Institutions Need To Catch Up
The world is in a state of transition and has been for a while. Across multiple domains from society and geopolitics to the economy, the future looks very different. Driven in part by societal shifts and rapid advances in science and technology, the foundation of society is changing. However, the institutions that support that society are not evolving or changing fast enough. I call this phenomenon Institution 2.0 and track it as a future scenario.
One of those institutions is Education. Learning – and the role it played throughout history – is key to managing through periods of transition. This YouTube Channel contains a series of interviews that we conducted on the topic. This video teaser describes the role of education in this emerging era.
YouTube Channel Launch
The journey to the future is gaining more attention for both the opportunity it presents, and the fear of unintended consequences. Dialog and proactive action are critical to shaping this emerging future in human-centric ways – a story line that is nicely articulated in a new book titled Shaping the Fourth Industrial Revolution. I am a firm believer that shaping the future requires a different mindset. As stated in the book, we must all adopt a zoom-in and zoom-out strategy: zooming in to acquire an understanding of the characteristics and potential disruptions of specific advances in science and technology; and zoom out to see the patterns and combinations that emerge.
Reimagining the Future 