A practical framework for thinking about the future... and an exploration of 'future consciousness' and how to develop it

Mastering the Way You See the World Inspired by Edward de Bono’s Six Thinking Hats method, Jim Gilmore has created a unique and useful tool to help our ability to perceive. In his latest book, Look: A Practical Guide for Improving Your Observational Skills, Gilmore introduces the metaphor of “six looking glasses.” Each looking glass represents a particular skill to master in order to enhance the way we look at the world. The six skills include binoculars, bifocals, magnifying glass, microscope, rose-colored glasses, and blindfold looking. Each looking glass provides an observational lens through which to see the world differently. This framework will help its users to: • See the big picture • Overcome personal bias • Pinpoint significance • Better scrutinize numerous details • Uncover potential opportunities • See what’s in the mind’s eye These varying perspectives offer myriad practical applications: They can help any executive, manager, or designer more richly observe customer behavior, philanthropists and policy makers more keenly identify human needs, and anyone else interested in innovative thinking to first ground their ideation in practical observation. ​Gilmore helps readers grasp the Six Looking Glasses by including helpful everyday examples and practice exercises throughout. Put into practice, this method of looking will help you see the world with new eyes.

Year ago the Chief of Staff of the Army initiated the Army After Next Project (AANP) as a means of stimulating constructive thinking about the Army's future throughout the service. AANP has quickly developed into a primary vehicle for long-range planning. Under the leadership of the Training and Doctrine Command (TRADOC), the AANP has conducted an ambitious program of studies, symposia and workshops, culminating in a Winter War Game and Senior Seminar held at Carlisle, January 27-February 6, 1997. A key line of initial inquiry for us has been to forecast the nature of the future security environment in which the Army will operate. That is the task Dr. Steven Metz set for himself in this monograph. In the pages that follow he propounds "currents of change" that will determine the future and sketches a series of plausible future security systems. Each system is characterized by the forms of conflict that will dominate it, the major strategic issues the United States might face, and the resulting military implications. While Dr. Metz's analysis leads to observations certain to be controversial, he illustrates quite clearly the primacy that environmental context will have in shaping our national security outlook and military strategy. Thus, Dr. Metz's observations on trends and systems warrant careful consideration as national policymakers and the Army's leaders build the military force of the future.

This text seeks to raise the curtain on competitive pricing strategies and asserts that businesses often miss their best opportunity for providing consumers with what they want - an experience. It presents a strategy for companies to script and stage the experiences provided by their products.

Growth unleashes benefits beyond the economic. It revitalizes organizations and invigorates the people in them, creating energy, a sense of purpose, and the glow of being on a winning team. Like the alchemy of old, it seeks to transform the everyday into the exalted by means that seem little short of magical. Yet growth is often elusive, achieved at unacceptable costs, or managed in fits and starts. Based on over three years of research and application at high-performing companies around the world, The Alchemy of Growth is a comprehensive, practical approach to initiating, achieving, and sustaining profitable growth—today and tomorrow. As the book shows, the secret is to manage business opportunities across three time horizons at once: extending and defending core businesses, building new businesses, and seeding options for the future. The Alchemy of Growth offers managers at all levels the tools and concepts for investing in the right initiatives, capabilities, and talent to propel their companies into the future.

Time is limited. Attention is scarce. Are you engaging your customers? Apple Stores, Disney, LEGO, Starbucks. Do these names conjure up images of mere goods and services, or do they evoke something more--something visceral? Welcome to the Experience Economy, where businesses must form unique connections in order to secure their customers' affections--and ensure their own economic vitality. This seminal book on experience innovation by Joe Pine and Jim Gilmore explores how savvy companies excel by offering compelling experiences for their customers, resulting not only in increased customer allegiance but also in a more profitable bottom line. Translated into thirteen languages, The Experience Economy has become a must-read for leaders of enterprises large and small, for-profit and nonprofit, global and local. Now with a brand-new preface, Pine and Gilmore make an even stronger case for experiences as the critical link between a company and its customers in an increasingly distractible and time-starved world. Filled with detailed examples and actionable advice, The Experience Economy helps companies create personal, dramatic, and even transformative experiences, offering the script from which managers can generate value in ways aligned with a strong customer-centric strategy.

Contrived. Disingenuous. Phony. Inauthentic. Do your customers use any of these words to describe what you sell—or how you sell it? If so, welcome to the club. Inundated by fakes and sophisticated counterfeits, people increasingly see the world in terms of real or fake. They would rather buy something real from someone genuine rather than something fake from some phony. When deciding to buy, consumers judge an offering's (and a company's) authenticity as much as—if not more than—price, quality, and availability. In Authenticity, James H. Gilmore and B. Joseph Pine II argue that to trounce rivals companies must grasp, manage, and excel at rendering authenticity. Through examples from a wide array of industries as well as government, nonprofit, education, and religious sectors, the authors show how to manage customers' perception of authenticity by: recognizing how businesses "fake it;" appealing to the five different genres of authenticity; charting how to be "true to self" and what you say you are; and crafting and implementing business strategies for rendering authenticity. The first to explore what authenticity really means for businesses and how companies can approach it both thoughtfully and thoroughly, this book is a must-read for any organization seeking to fulfill consumers' intensifying demand for the real deal.

Over the last 25 years, Geoffrey Moore has established himself as one of the most influential high-tech advisors in the world—once prompting Conan O’Brien to ask “Who is Geoffrey Moore and why is he more famous than me?” Following up on the ferociously innovative ESCAPE VELOCITY, which served as the basis for Moore’s consulting work to such companies as Salesforce, Microsoft, and Intel, ZONE TO WIN serves as the companion playbook for his landmark guide, offering a practical manual to address the challenge large enterprises face when they seek to add a new line of business to their established portfolio. Focused on spurring next-generation growth, guiding mergers and acquisitions, and embracing disruption and innovation, ZONE TO WIN is a high-powered tool for driving your company above and beyond its limitations, its definitions of success, and ultimately, its competitors. Moore’s classic bestseller, CROSSING THE CHASM, has sold more than one million copies by addressing the challenges faced by start-up companies. Now ZONE TO WIN is set to guide established enterprises through the same journey. “For any company, regardless of size or industry, ZONE TO WIN is the playbook for succeeding in today’s disruptive, connected, fast-paced business world.” —Marc Benioff, CEO, Salesforce “Once again Geoffrey Moore weighs in with a prescient examination of what it takes to win in today’s competitive, disruptive business environment.” —Satya Nadella, CEO, Microsoft "With this book, Geoffrey Moore continues to lead us all through ever-changing times...His work has changed the game of changing the game!" —Gary Kovacs, CEO, AVG “ZONE TO WIN uses crystal-clear language to describe the management plays necessary to win in an ever-disrupting marketplace. Regardless of your level of management experience, you will find this book an invaluable tool for building long-term success for your business.” —Lip-Bu Tan, President and CEO, Cadence Design Systems

“Shows how humans have brought us to the brink and how humanity can find solutions. I urge people to read with humility and the daring to act.” —Harpal Singh, former Chair, Save the Children, India, and former Vice Chair, Save the Children International In conversations with people all over the world, from government officials and business leaders to taxi drivers and schoolteachers, Blair Sheppard, global leader for strategy and leadership at PwC, discovered they all had surprisingly similar concerns. In this prescient and pragmatic book, he and his team sum up these concerns in what they call the ADAPT framework: Asymmetry of wealth; Disruption wrought by the unexpected and often problematic consequences of technology; Age disparities--stresses caused by very young or very old populations in developed and emerging countries; Polarization as a symptom of the breakdown in global and national consensus; and loss of Trust in the institutions that underpin and stabilize society. These concerns are in turn precipitating four crises: a crisis of prosperity, a crisis of technology, a crisis of institutional legitimacy, and a crisis of leadership. Sheppard and his team analyze the complex roots of these crises--but they also offer solutions, albeit often seemingly counterintuitive ones. For example, in an era of globalization, we need to place a much greater emphasis on developing self-sustaining local economies. And as technology permeates our lives, we need computer scientists and engineers conversant with sociology and psychology and poets who can code. The authors argue persuasively that we have only a decade to make headway on these problems. But if we tackle them now, thoughtfully, imaginatively, creatively, and energetically, in ten years we could be looking at a dawn instead of darkness.

Using an interdisciplinary social-science approach, Temporal Horizons and Strategic Decisions in US–China Relations: Between Instant and Infinite takes on the challenge of understanding the foreign policy decision process through the lens of the temporal horizon. A temporal horizon is the distance into the future a decision-maker prioritizes when evaluating outcomes and considering possibilities. By looking at a number of recent key moments of US–China relations that have immediate, short-term, long term, and far-reaching implications, the book considers which are predominant in the policy process. Looking at the role of time as a factor in the decision-making process is not new to political science, but this book attempts to break down and articulate the process by looking at a range of specific time frames. The book places special attention on future considerations in a variety of ways, combining the insights of psychology, economics, and future studies to consider political science in a new manner.