10 lessons for the future that you will learn during Covid-19

/in , /by

By LISELOTTE LYNGSØ, Futurist, CEO and Founder of Future Navigator.

Never in recent history have so many people changed their behavior to such a great extent and in such a short time as we are witnessing right now. As a futurist, with more than 20 years of experience, I’ve never witnessed a situation as radical and profound as this one. The Corona-crisis has thrown us into pitch black water. Trends that were already emerging are suddenly coming under a huge magnifying glass. Families have to adapt to spending time together in a whole new way. Workplaces have to learn to work together – apart. New rules apply. The world has involuntarily been turned into a future laboratory. Corona gives us an amazing opportunity to kickstart our training for the world of tomorrow. Here are at least 10 areas that will influence society beyond the war against COVID-19. 

1. Our belief in experts will be reinvented

We have been through a long period of living with terms like “fake news”, “alternative truths” and “post-factual society”, where integrity did not matter as long as the story was good. However, we are now in the midst of a situation where knowledge is everything. I mean, real knowledge. The admission to have an opinion and contribute is based on professional proficiency and not the number of likes, followers on Instagram or the ability to shout the loudest. Severity and knowledge are a perfect match and this will apply in the years after COVID-19. 

Experts are people with a specific and profound insight that we can all benefit from. We already knew this. We just forgot it in the middle of social media’s overload of influencers and opinions. The fact that we have now discovered the difference between true and false will be crucial for our opportunity to solve other important questions. For example, our climate crisis.

2. We will learn to react to invisible danger

For a long time, Corona was only in Wuhan. Only a few people had imagined that it would spread from China to the world. We couldn’t see the disease, we couldn’t understand it, we couldn’t feel the destiny of the Chinese population in our own life and that is exactly the point. Many of the challenges that we will meet in the future won’t be visible to us before they knock on our door and it’s too late. 

For many years, we have spoken about exponentiality without really sensing what we were talking about, other than a mathematical formula that could lead to disruption. Now, we all get to experience the exponential curve the hard way. This understanding will be an advantage when the technological revolution really kicks in or when ice begins to melt with accelerating speed, and we’re forced to adapt quickly. We’ve been given a collective lesson in why it’s so important to act straight away and not to wait for the tipping point – once it’s too late. 

3. The feedback crisis will force us to be inter-personal

Our homes have been transformed into small, digital hubs. Meetings are being held online. Every advantage is being taken and many people will discover the efficiency of the 15-minute meeting. Why did we waste so much time on meetings and unnecessary chatting before? The trend of distance working has been here for a while.

In February 2020, Forbes Magazine pointed to a survey indicating that businesses offering people to work where, when and how it suits them as the most crucial parameter for attracting and retaining young talent. Now working together apart will go crazy in most areas. However, it will only work if we also become better at giving and receiving feedback. It’s not that we don’t give any kind of feedback. We’re constantly asked to rank and rate on TripAdvisor and TrustPilot. From public bathroom to butcher, we can’t walk into a facility without being asked to consider whether the service was good or bad. Our relationships are being transformed into algorithms in our online society and teleworking is amplifying that development. But it’s also amplifying the feedback crisis that we’re moving into.

Because when we exchange feedback into anonymous numbers, we risk overseeing the responses that answer the questions that are not posed and those are often the most important. How are we supposed to interpret the fact that we scored a 5 instead of a 6 on a scale from 1 to 10? And what will happen to the taboos that require trust and person to person presence to interprete. There is a real risk that constantly communicating with chatbots and algorithms that answer our questions and are designed to always support our existing viewpoints – will make us blunt and ego centered. If we’re going to exploit the great potential that teleworking has, it’s extremely important that we address our skin hunger, train our ability to listen louder (to stuff that is not on the agenda) and are curious and empathetic to diversity when we finally meet again. 

4. By pushing the “exit button”, we’ll practice being the main characters of our own lives

Netflix, HBO and all the other streaming services are really making the big bucks these days. Perform your civic duty: Stay at home on your couch. Do it for your country. It’s a sneak peek into a future where more and more people risk becoming passive bystanders. It might be with a high level of entertainment and constantly improving content. But it’s still binging. Infotainment bulimia. The winners of the world of tomorrow will be those that manage to keep focus on whatever helps them to thrive and develop. Are we learning to speak a new language? Are we redecorating? Are we signing up to help out in our community – if we’re allowed? We have to enhance our strength to not get overwhelmed by the constant breaking news, and instead take control over our lives. The Corona-crisis is our chance to train the ability to focus at a time when the world is extremely luring, uncertain and noisy.

5. From hospitals to health at home

We’ve been put in a situation where we’re forced to take responsibility for our own health. Am I sick? Do I have a fever? No one dares to cough anymore – only when they’re alone. We stay home as much and as long as we can, avoiding admission at any cost. Hospitals are only for very, very sick people! Not us!

DIY health requires that our knowledge about our own well-being dramatically increases. We will all have to monitor our temperature, our breathing, our general condition. It will raise a number of ethical questions. Will the data that we collect be private or public? Should we let our employer know if our smart watch predicts that we’re coming down with a cold. Or should we tell our grandmother that our phone has told us that our Tinder date on Friday night turned out to be contagious? Can future employers demand that their employees use technology to monitor their health? In any case, we will see an explosion of voluntary self-monitoring- and diagnosing so that we – and our surroundings – can handle anxiety, breakdowns and colds before they occur. Expect new home hospitals entering our households. 

6. The discovery of new paths of learning for both children and adults

Tele-education has been a hot discussion topic for a while. However, mostly it has been a means to integrate the periphery and many people have perceived any initiative regarding distance learning, as an attempt to cut down on expenses. Now there is no other way. All education has been moved to an online platform. My son has been asked to monitor his pulse and track his runs as a part of his gym lessons. He enjoys the fact that the usual hierarchy, where the overachievers, those who always sit at the front row and are always heard, no longer exists. Now, everyone contributes their answer in the commenting field online. Artificial intelligence detects your weaknesses and finds adaptive exercises that match your level perfectly. There is no one calling you stupid anymore.

All teachers are being tested on their digital skills across differing ideologies. We’re freed from shallow discussions about whether school time should involve screen time. Educators and students are forced to take advantage of different online learning methods, so that one size is replaced by my size. Furthermore, it seems that teachers as well as students are very enthusiastic. Everyone feels a great obligation to perform as well as possible, in this time of distress. People step out of the ordinary and dare to experiment. What will be crucial is the systematic evaluation of the digital classroom across the globe. How do the students react? How do the teachers react? How could it be used to democratize learning? And how could it help us with lifelong training and development? We will never see a better opportunity to get experience, than this. 

7. We stop overspending and become conscious consumers 

These days we focus a lot on our consumption – especially our over-consumption. I’m hardly the only one who’s had to cancel Easter holidays. Many people have had a party cancelled or had to postpone a trip to the movie theater. The Covid-19 crisis has reminded us about what really matters. A good health for ourselves and our loved ones and the means to support our family. We already knew this. We just forgot it. 

Over-spending is being reversed to underspending – and well, at least in the rich part of the world – we will discover that it’s actually not that bad. We’ve already talked about the term “staycation” in order to cut our carbon footprint. The Coronavirus will force us to do so. Many people will find that working smarter and consuming less is actually not such a crazy idea. That a trip to New York or Paris isn’t so important after all.

8. We redecorate our lives

37 types of families have been forced to fit into a highly inflexible real estate market, created for the traditional nuclear family with two adults and two children. The Corona-crisis will leave its marks on our homes. Never in recent times have so many families spent so much time together, in such a small space and for such a long period of time. Our homes are where the kids go to school, the parents work, and all the life in between is being unfolded. We’ll find out exactly what works and what doesn’t. Corona is the ultimate test of our everyday life.

We will create multifunctional rooms, build tailored indoor caves, throw out like mad men, clean, cook and redecorate like never before. The living room will suddenly become a conference room. Then it will be transformed into a gym. Then into a creative painting workshop for the kids. Our home needs to rise to the occasion: it will be designed for its inhabitants rather than vice versa. We will no longer wish to fit into designated rooms – we want to design them to our specific and changing needs.

9. We take a break to think

Where will it all end? Will I or my loved ones get infected in this or the next COVID-19 wave? Am I going to lose my job? What am I going to live off of? Who will need me? The leisure and live entertainment industries, which have traditionally been safe havens, are suddenly with zero earnings and all activities cancelled. No wonder that we’re totally stressed out about having to come up with new forms of value creation. We don’t know the rules of the game, nor do we even understand it. When we last spoke about disruption, automation and robots taking over our jobs, the insecurity seemed blurred and abstract.

Now, it’s clear to everyone (except for our indispensable heroes within healthcare) what it means to be hit right back to square one. We’ve gotten an existential wake-up-call. Everyday life as we know it can actually end from one press conference in the Prime Minister’s Office to the next. We will replace our retirement with breaks where we re-orientate to a changing labor market. Corona has given us a timeout to reflect about what value we can contribute to society – also in the long run. 

10. Our curiosity about other cultures increases

For years and years, we’ve talked about the global village. The moon landing and events like the Olympics have made the world seem smaller. Now, we have jointly had the experience of being at war against Corona as allies. This stands in sharp contrast to our role as victims of a political and ideological trade war between the United States and China, with destructive accusations being thrown back and forth. We might not be able to travel physically but Corona has made us interested in getting to know each other at a much deeper level. How are other nations and cultures coping with isolation? How are they doing in Spain? What are the rules in South Korea? Have they stopped kissing each other on the cheek in France? How are the Italians burying their dear ones? Is it really true that the Chinese have been able to contain the infection? 

Perhaps we will, after all, become global citizens, who get inspired by other countries’ ways of doing things. The great international institutions have, with their silence, left us to make our own conclusions. Everything is on its head right now. But there’s one thing that I’m certain of. The Corona-crisis will improve our ability to sense and navigate the future! 

Read the article, written by Liselotte Lyngsø, in Danish here.

Copyright: Future Navigator

MASTER THE ART OF TRENDSPOTTING
AND HOST YOUR OWN TREND MAPPING WORKSHOPS

Do you want to learn how to spot trends and translate the future into strategy, ideas and development for you and your organization? 

Sign up for Future Navigators online or physical trendspotting masterclass! 

International women's day 2020: What has to change?

International women’s day 2020: What has to change?

/in , /by

How did you spend your international women’s day 2020? What changes would you like to see for women and girls in your lifetime?

“Right now only 5.7% of Danish top executives are female. My guess is other ethnicities account for a fraction. Both men and women need to put change in motion on inequality as well as lack of diversity and inclusion.” 

–Aram Ostadian-Binai.

Global Mentoring Walk is a flagship event created by Vital Voices. An organization founded in 1997 by Hillary Clinton and Madeleine Albright. It’s based on the desire to support other women’s “global voice” professionally, legally and politically.

Through Vital Voices’ Global Mentoring Walk, mentors and mentees come together to walk in their communities. To share challenges and solutions. And to form supportive bonds that foster growth, confidence and leadership.

Listen to someone you never dreamt of talking to

Futurist and founder of Future Navigator, Liselotte Lyngso gave a speech on the international women’s day 2020. She spoke about how important it is to get feedback from those who we actually can’t stand. They might be able to give us the last piece of the puzzle that we haven’t been able to complete. The future is already out there. Therefore, we have to train our ability to spot it. And not by doing Google searches. But by surrounding ourselves with work fields and people whose priorities and perspectives are completely different from our own.

Future Navigator were so provoked by an engineer who said that it was really easy to cheat in our boardgame, “Typical”. I mean, who decides to enter a game, just to sit and cheat!? But that provocation actually ended up becoming literally a game changer for the way we ended up designing the “engine”.  The result was a much better and smarter game with rules that made it impossible to bluff and lots of incentives to do your best.

What types of people would you benefit from listening to? Who really pisses you off?

Film maker: Maiken Kestner. Production: Inspire Film by Josefine Volqvartz. 

Thanks to #cphmentoringwalk team for this important initiative

Anne Sofie Josephsen.

Ann Randrup.

Diana Grimberg.

Ritanshu Kashyap.

For fellow speakers who shared concrete tools to make the right change happen

Bente Dalsbæk.

Marie-Louise Rahbek. 

Marianne Dahl. 

Heidi Boye.

Eva Riedel.

Lone Bløcher Kjøge.

Astrid Haug.

Hanne Leth Andersen.

Liselotte Lyngso.

Charline Charli Skovgaard.

Photographer: Maiken Kestner.

MASTER THE ART OF TRENDSPOTTING
AND HOST YOUR OWN TREND MAPPING WORKSHOPS

Do you want to learn how to spot trends and translate the future into strategy, ideas and development for you and your organization? 

Sign up for Future Navigators online or physical trendspotting masterclass! 

3 megatrends that will transform the future of communication

3 megatrends that will transform the future of communication

/in , /by

With all the technology that we have today and all that’s still yet to come – what will communication be all about in the future?

Liselotte Lyngso, Futurist in Future Navigator, was moderating Digital Copenhagen 2019. She presented 3 megatrends that will transform the way we communicate in the future.

Feedback crisis!

Over the years, technology has made it super easy for us to communicate with each other. If we have a problem with a product, we have 24/7 assistance from chatbots. The internet makes it possible for us to call or text from one end of the world to another! We will have smart speakers, that can answer any question and that will recognize our every need before we even know them ourselves. We won’t call each other – it’s so much faster to send a text and avoid the small talk! Communication has never been easier than it is today – but maybe it has actually become too easy!?

Digitalization will take us to a level where we’re getting into a person to person feedback crisis. Because we are moving further and further away from talking to each other, people will become worse at giving feedback. Standing in front of someone and telling them how they can improve, reading their body language and expressing empathy will seem unnatural for a generation of onscreeners. Most of the communication we will experience, will be from social media or from our chatbots. Not exactly the kind of feedback that we need in terms of handling the tough subjects and taboos.

Thus, the luxury in a future of onscreeners will be to be catered for by a team of people present and aware of you. To be able to hand pick the people that can give us the best and most honest feedback. People that we can look in the eye and communicate with properly.

Unlimited knowledge

The second major trend in terms of communication will be that knowledge will no longer be a shortage. This will revolutionize the way we do marketing, customer service and other empathy driven matters. Imagine if we had a chip inserted in our heads, that made it possible for us to know exactly what each other were feeling? People would make a much greater effort in handling you as a customer, because your rating and actual reaction would be visible for everyone to see.

New role models

The kids that are growing up right now are expected to live until they’re 120 years old. Therefore, their concern towards climate change is extremely urgent. They look at their parents and are totally mortified by the way they don’t feel the same obligation to make a difference. They definitely won’t see them as very good role models and will instead look up to heroes as Greta Thunberg and other activists.

So, we’re looking towards a new generation of rebels. For them, authorities simply won’t be a thing anymore. They will only want to share data with, work for and shop from people who are as determined to taking care of our world as they are. They have no time for comprise and they know exactly how valuable they are as the shortage for talents on the labour market will only increase during the next 10 years.

Watch the video with with Liselotte Lyngso and get inspired by how these 3 trends will transform the way we communicate.

MASTER THE ART OF TRENDSPOTTING
AND HOST YOUR OWN TREND MAPPING WORKSHOPS

Do you want to learn how to spot trends and translate the future into strategy, ideas and development for you and your organization? 

Sign up for Future Navigators online or physical trendspotting masterclass! 

Working together apart - will you be a time owner or a time slave?

Working together apart – will you be a time owner or a time slave?

/in , /by

If you had the opportunity to work anywhere you’d like. Where would it be? Would you stay in bed, go to a café, pick a co-working space together with like-minded neighbors – stay in your regular office? What kind of atmosphere works best for YOU? Maybe its situation-based, maybe it’s a specific version – freedom is being able to design the optimal work-life for your needs. And according to Forbes, flexible working spaces will be the main competitive force for recruiting talents in the years to come.

People are different. Some require complete silence and square walls to get a job done. Some find, that their creative sense is reinforced when sitting in lively surroundings or when they listen to music.

Once upon a time, the office was at the heart of our work. When we went in, it was time for work. When we got out again, we were free. Today, our view of when, where and how we work is much different. From having everyone work in set places and hours, more and more people strive to design their work lives, to their needs. Because why not? Unfortunately, not everyone is able to do that. The hierarchy of the future will be the battle between time-owners and time-slaves. Who decides when and where to meet? You or your colleagues – or do you take turns?

Joes & Cos is a business that catches this trend by broadening the workspace options. Just like a fitness club, they provide free access to various work-place environments so that you can navigate amongst the many options that are popping up everywhere. That way you can combine your office with being a “work-life” tourist experimenting with new ways of working and meeting up with people at locations that are easy to access.  One day your office can be by the waterfront. The next day, it can be in the very city center.

Together with Joes and Cos, Liselotte Lyngsø, Future Navigator talked about the future of work and how she gets her job done.

Keep your employers by setting them free!

«Your first and most important board meeting should be with yourself. Are you happy? Are you giving yourself enough credit? »

-Liselotte Lyngsø

We will get older and older and we will work more. Therefore, it’s extremely important that we are happy with what we do and where and when we do it! In the future, we’ll go from everyone having to sit in an office all day to letting people tailor their own work life so that it fits their needs completely. This is why coworking spaces are booming right now all over the world! People have found out that they’re not forced to sit in their offices anymore. With digitalization and mobile technology, they can pretty much work from everywhere.

So, leaders of the future: take note! People won’t tolerate to have their workspace decided for them. In order to keep your employees happy, you will have to set them free. Let them be creative, where and how they want.

«In the future more and more people have to design their own work life. That’s really scary, because you’re always double scared of what you’re going to lose, rather than what you’re going to gain. But don’t worry – try to enjoy the journey instead » 

-Liselotte Lyngsø

READ ALSO: “The future of the workplace” with Liselotte Lyngsø.

Watch the short video with Liselotte Lyngsø about working outside the office right here.

If you want to read more about the future worklife, you might also find this article with Liselotte Lyngsø interesting.

MASTER THE ART OF TRENDSPOTTING
AND HOST YOUR OWN TREND MAPPING WORKSHOPS

Do you want to learn how to spot trends and translate the future into strategy, ideas and development for you and your organization? 

Sign up for Future Navigators online or physical trendspotting masterclass! 

The future of X #2: Gamification

The future of X #2: Gamification

/in , , /by

What if your work could be as fun as a game? Wouldn’t it be much more motivation and exciting to go to work, if you knew you would be rewarded as you would in a game? If for every client you gained or product you sold, you would “reach a new level”? Think about it. Maybe you’re already playing!

On the second episode of OZY’s newest season of the podcast, The Future of X: The workplace, futurist Liselotte Lyngso joins the discussion of how gamification will change the way we work. On this episode, her co-experts are Mark Stevenson, Keisha Howard, Gene Farrell and James Canton.

“The future isn’t so abstract when it comes to gamification. It’s already all around us. Pilots hire gamers to become pilots, because they’ve basically already done the training.”

-Liselotte Lyngso.

Do you like your job?

Mark Stevenson is a futurist and the author of “An Optimist’s Tour of the Future” and one of his biggest worries about today’s work life is employee disengagement. He wonders why work isn’t enjoyable, when it’s such a significant part of our lives.

“The average employee is currently productive for about three to four hours a day. 85 percent of employees are disengaged with their work.”

-Mark Stevenson.

Maybe employee disengagement is a cause of habit. We’ve gotten so used to doing the things we do, and we’re not even sure why we do it anymore. Or maybe we don’t care, because our boss doesn’t give us high enough demands. No matter what causes this, something has to be done.

If you dislike your job, it’s most likely the way you have to perform your job, that you don’t like. According to Mark Stevenson, we can fight this by making the active replication enjoyable itself. An example of this is having sex. Society would say that we have sex because we enjoy it. But the biological explanation is actually that we have to reproduce ourselves. So, we would probably still do it, even if Mother Nature hadn’t made it enjoyable for us. It’s kind of the same thing with our work. Whether we like it or not, we have to do it in order to support ourselves. But doing a “Mother Nature” and making it more enjoyable would probably solve a lot of issues and enhance our productivity tremendously!

Your gamer group is your new team mates

So how do we then make our jobs more fun? Mark Stevenson suggests gamification. This is something that Keisha Howard, the founder of Sugar Gamers, agrees strongly with. Her point is that human beings, kids, and animals intrinsically learn through play. And that gamification will have a positive influence on a lot of spectrums in our work lives.

“If we could quantify or qualify our work skills like in a game, or level up and earn points, it would motivate people in a whole new way. Maybe even give them a completely new platform to relate to one another.”

-Keisha Howard.

But gamification wouldn’t only be a way of motivating people to do their jobs. It might actually be the foundation of a whole new way of creating work teams. In a lot of video games, roleplay and choosing your own character is a big part of the game. The idea is to team up with players who have skills that you don’t. So, the characters might not be good at everything individually, but when they come together as a team, they can be a very powerful source. If we began to create work teams like we do in video games, it could revolutionize the whole team dynamic at the future workplace.

Today, we strike to perform perfectly every time and we’re really hard on ourselves if we don’t succeed. In gaming, everyone loses all the time. The point is exactly that you can only win when you’ve actually allowed yourself to lose all those times. Therefore, gamification might also create a whole new idea of what it means to lose.

How will democratizing problem solving influence future work life, and what might become some of the downsides to introducing gamification in future work life? Listen to the rest of the podcast with Liselotte Lyngso here, and find out.

Want to read more about the future workplace and work life? Check out these articles with Liselotte Lyngso.

MASTER THE ART OF TRENDSPOTTING
AND HOST YOUR OWN TREND MAPPING WORKSHOPS

Do you want to learn how to spot trends and translate the future into strategy, ideas and development for you and your organization? 

Sign up for Future Navigators online or physical trendspotting masterclass! 

The future of X #1: the workplace

The future of X #1: the workplace

/in , /by

The future workplace is beyond the office. And our tools are becoming smarter and more powerful. How and why will our work change over the next 50 years? What does the next generation of the workforce care about? 

Futurist Liselotte Lyngsø, Future Navigator, is proud to be a part of OZY’s newest season of the podcast, The Future of X: The workplace. She talks about how frustration, curiosity and creativity is the key to success in the worklife of the future. To also give their input about the subject, was CEO of the Institute for Global Futures, James Canton and CEO of Smartsheet, Mark Mader. 

Based on OZY’s journalism and timely interviews with leading futurists, the podcast examines the ways in which technology will improve the contributions humans make to the world.

Watch out for the robots! Or what?

People often get really worried when they think about their future. Especially when it comes to their worklife, and especially in these times. Over the years, the technological era has really shown its face. The development of machines and robots is so fast, it’s hard to keep track of what we’ve got and what’s still yet to come. We talk about how almost every job that we see today is going to be a machine driven job in the future workplace and we ask: “well am I then going to be out of a job?”.

The truth is, human work has been evolving for a long time. It’s less than a 100 years ago that almost 100% of the jobs back then was found on farms. Who does the work on current farms? Machines! And the farmers are still not unemployed. They just found something better do do with their time. Doctor James Cantor states that as it is, humans aren’t event qualified to do future jobs. They need to learn new skills to stay in work. Human, emotional skills, that no robot can master.

“We need to understand as individuals – as leaders of companies and organizations, as leaders of even nations – that we are in a seismic change in the workforce.”

-James Canton, CEO of the Institute for Global Futures.

From being an on-looker to doing!

Maybe the robots will overtake the future workplace. But does that stop us from working? Or does it give us room to do what we’re actually qualified to do? We no longer need to be machines and do the hard work. In the future, people will study to become great humans. Learning human skills and mastering human emotions.

“Everyone should be creative! And creativity needs oxygen which we’ll get when less meaningful work is done by AI and machines.” 

-Mark Mader, CEO of Smartsheet.

Think about the inventions and ideas that have been brought to life over time. Robotic vacuum cleaners, loan mowers etc. Where did they come from? Why did we start inventing machines in the first place? Because we didn’t want to do the boring housework ourselves! Frustration leads to a better, smarter solution.

“For me creativity is also being lazy. It’s also being irritated. It’s also being curious. It’s basically being all the stuff that machines are not.”

-Liselotte Lyngsø, Future Navigator.

That’s what the machines are for!

For the next generation, a job is never going to just be a job anymore. And future leaders will also expect so much more from their employees. Not just that they do the paperwork – the machines can do that. But that they bring creativity and innovation into every project that they’re handed. The future workplace is not about looking at what everyone else is doing. We have to make the best out of people and create mening wherever we go.

How do we prepare people for what to come? Are people without a degree in science or math going to be jobless in the future? Not according to Mark Mader, but that’s for you to hear about in the first episode of The Future Workplace by OZY.

You can also read more about the future workplace in these articles with Liselotte Lyngso.

MASTER THE ART OF TRENDSPOTTING
AND HOST YOUR OWN TREND MAPPING WORKSHOPS

Do you want to learn how to spot trends and translate the future into strategy, ideas and development for you and your organization? 

Sign up for Future Navigators online or physical trendspotting masterclass! 

Let's save the climate - no time for compromises!

Let’s save the climate – no time for compromises!

/in , /by

C40 Cities is an organization that connects more than 90 of the world’s leading cities to take bold climate action and build a healthier and more sustainable future. They represent more than 700 million citizens and one quarter of the global economy. Therefore the mayors of C40 Cities are committed to deliver on the goals of the Paris Agreement. Both at the local level, as well as to clean the air we breathe.

This year’s C40 Mayors Summit was hosted in Copenhagen and futurist Liselotte Lyngsø took part of the event.

The youth take over

The goal was to build a global alliance between leading cities, businesses and citizens. An alliance that takes the radical and ambitious climate action that our planet needs. At this year’s event, the attendance of young people was significant. For the past year with all the climate strikes, millions of children all around the world have shown that they will take action and do what has to be done.

“We know that we are young. And we know that in the eyes of a lot of political leaders around the world, we are simply just kids. But our biggest wish for this meeting today is to sit down together as equal citizens. Not just as kids and adults but as a joint group who are all fighting for the same cause.”

A subject that took great place of discussion was climate in job and career. Today, there isn’t many sustainable jobs and university courses dealing with climate-related challenges. The youth makes up the next generation. Therefore it’s extremely important that they have the opportunity to choose career paths that address our future. If they work exclusively with climate change, it may actually entail economic problems!

Several green proposals regarding climate in job and career were developed by jury members – citizens from around the world. One idea was to make an online platform that gathers all our green job opportunities in one place. The platform would then provide a guide or strategy that inspires people to the pursuit of a green and impactful career.

The future generation has strict demands for their employers

Another idea was to make a green manifesto. This agreement commits people to avoid the employment of polluting and unsustainable companies. As a part of the judging jury, Liselotte Lyngsø supported the idea.”Only businesses living up to the green manifesto can enter a platform for recruiting the next generation. The youth will refuse to work, shop or support any businesses that are not living up to the demands of the manifesto. You will be kicked out – as a user as well as a business – if you do not develop in a sustainable direction! They know that their power lies in their feet.” -Liselotte Lyngsø.  Watch the speech from Selma De Montgomery (14 years) on behalf of the Youth Takeover participants among speeches from Mayors of Copenhagen, Paris, Freetown and Seattle and other youth activists at this link or read more about the C40 summit 2019 here. You can also read all developed proposals for future sustainable jobs in this Youth Takeover Folder – How can cities pave the way for a sustainable generation.

The Social Travel Summit with Liselotte Lyngso

The Social Travel Summit with Liselotte Lyngso

/in , /by

The Social Travel Summit is an annual gathering of professional travel bloggers and influencers from around the world. This year, in 2019, the event was hosted in Ravenna in Italy. The Social Travel Summit is a platform where people in the traveling industry discuss different issues related to tourism and influencer marketing. Here, they think about what improvements there should be made. One of the biggest topics of 2019 was sustainability. How can we continue traveling and still watch out for our planet? Futurist Liselotte Lyngsø gave a keynote at this year’s Social Travel Summit. She talked about traveling, sustainability and trust. 

Travel bloggers are becoming the new authority

Travel bloggers are taking over the guiding role from traditional authorities. Telling us where to go, what to see. Because of their authority, people follow their lead. Therefor, a lot of them also try to travel in far more sustainable ways. Thus, the bloggers have a huge responsibility with regard to making traveling a part of a sustainable solution rather than the problem. And our need for traveling will only increase. 1) People prefer travel over buying more stuff.2) A growing middle class wants to travel the world.3) The internet is turning us into grasshoppers all opting for the same destinations.4) Elderly people are enjoying retirement by seeing the world rather than staying at home.

Watch the video about The Social Travel Summit on Youtube

If you want to read more about Liselotte’s view on traveling, here is a danish article about solo traveling. 

What will our work life look like in the year 2100?

What will our work life look like in the year 2100?

/in , /by

Machines and robots have already taken over many of the jobs that used to be performed by humans. This development will only continue in the future. There’s no way to stop it. The question is whether the change is necessarily going to have a negative effect. It might actually end up giving us a whole new perspective on our work life!

In the radio program “The Naked Scientists” from BBC, futurist Liselotte Lyngsø talks about what we can expect from future work life, where robots have been given all the physically tough assignments.

How to get a job in the future: be good at being a human

Take a deep breath and stop getting worried about loosing your job to fast and top tuned robots. Think about how it might end up being a total win win situation. All indicators show that the more we put technology into different areas, the more busy we get ourselves. Within healthcare, we now monitor elderly people in order to know exactly when they need water or exercise. It has created this hydra’s head with even more jobs for the healthcare providers. We will be around 10 billion people so there will be plenty of stuff to do, it will just be different tasks than we’re used to.

Today, many people get stressed and have to take leaves from their work. In the future we’ll look back and think that “people were so primitive, pushing people like lemons! Now we can actually get something better out of people, because we understand how they work.”

Yes, robots will take over many of the jobs that we have today. Luckily, there will be so many new jobs that we haven’t even discovered yet. Those jobs will require qualities that robots can’t offer, such as an emphatic mindset. We’ll make robots do the “hard work” and have people work in a whole other way. A way, tailored for them individually, so that they won’t get stressed and depressed. We’ll also go from “headhunting” to “teamhunting” because people work better together and need human contact. We won’t go on retirement anymore, instead we’ll take breaks and get recharged during our work life.

Empathy is key

“Looking at ourselves as machines, that’s a big mistake. We really have to find out about human nature. Empathy will be important and difficult for the machines to master and the ability to be irritated is going to be the key to clever innovation. Likewise people can get lazy, and that’s also a good sentiment if you want to create a better planet because we find ways of doing things in smarter ways. We have to tease out human capabilities and find out how to find our individual potentials”.

-Liselotte Lyngsø

Listen to the whole radio program with Liselotte Lyngsø and learn about what future offices are going to look like when holograms are fully developed. You can also discover why we’ll replace our traditional education with micro chips and implants of memories!

You can also read the article “This is what work will look like in year 2100” from Fast Company, where Lyngsø explains further about the subject of how people will work in the future of machines and robots.

The Baby Translator will revolutionize future parenthood

The Baby Translator will revolutionize future parenthood

/in , /by

Imagine always knowing exactly how your baby is feeling. A future where you can read your baby’s mind! Will mind reading solve the problems that we have in this world with lack of empathy? Or will it lead to huge conflicts? 

In a video created by NN Group, futurist Liselotte Lyngsø speaks about how we will soon be able to read brain waves and discusses the huge impact it might have on the world as we know it.

Mind reading and the end of privacy 

We already have technology that allows us to translate brain waves into language. What if you could buy an accessory or piece of clothing for your baby which in the same time makes it possible for you to understand exactly what is going on in its mind?

It’s not only the minds of babies that we have trouble figuring out. It’s not only a device for parents. Everyone would benefit from having access to a technology which makes it easier understand each other at a deeper level. Maybe it would even strengthen our ability to emphasize!

Watch the video with Liselotte Lyngsø here – would you buy the device?

READ ALSO: “3 megatrends that will transform the future of communication” with Liselotte Lyngso.