Everyone needs to be a futurist — from innovationexcellence.co by Reuven Gorsht

Excerpts (emphasis DSC):

While most of us work on the day-to-day operational details and focus on hitting the metrics, we often assume that there must be someone in the company that is thinking about the future. Whether we assume it’s the board, senior executives or perhaps the corporate strategy team, we somewhat believe that somewhere above our level, both the foresight and plans exist to stave disruption, capitalize on new opportunities and figure out exactly how the company needs to change to either survive or achieve the next paradigm of growth.

This, however, is a fallacy that lands organizations and individuals in a lot of hot water. While most of us are in roles where we are focused on exploiting the current business model, nowadays, everyone’s job, regardless of level, is to be somewhat of a futurist who is able to foresee where the business is going and internalize the change by creating and executing their individual plans.

Everyone needs to be a futurist.

…

Yes, we all have full-time jobs and enough on our plates to keep us busy, but without an investment in gaining the foresight and our own personal meaning on where our company, industry and roles are going, how might we proactively keep ourselves relevant? Sometimes ignorance is bliss, and most of us prefer to be in our comfort zones, but we’ve all seen the recent wake-up calls from companies such as Nokia, New York Times and Blackberry.

When it gets to a point that senior leadership has to write a manifesto that calls for drastic change, it is likely too late to start shifting yourself to adjust to the new realities of your company. Only by being proactive, can we effectively internalize what it may mean for us individually and create the runway necessary to make the shift.

Bottom line: If you’re not spending some time understanding the future and what it means to you personally, you are effectively putting yourself in the position of being tapped on the shoulder one day and being told that you are no longer relevant to where the company is headed.