Episode Summary
Jonathan Brill reading from Marshall McLuhan’s The Medium Is the Massage, and discussing inventing your future by increasing both your optionality and your potential.
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I remember being in New Orleans some years ago, where people were offering to read your palm and tell your future. I was interested – I’d like to know how the future pans out. So, I picked somebody, and she proceeded to provide an amazingly disappointing performance that was mostly a combination of boring, wrong, and clichéd. I didn’t get my $20 worth, but what if you could see the future? What would you want to know, and what would you not want to know?
Jonathan Brill is an author and a speaker, but perhaps he’s also the oracle that I’ve been seeking. He is, according to his business card, a Futurist. For the first years of his career, his focus revolved around innovation and what products would shape the future. But then he accepted a new role in a new organization, which he assumed would be more of the same. Irony alert – turns out the future wasn’t as predictable as he thought.
Jonathan reads two pages from ‘The Medium Is the Massage’ by Marshall McLuhan. [reading begins at 17:05]
Hear us discuss:
- Understanding the shape of a question. [8:13]
- Three tips for community building. [11:19]
- How to stay engaged, yet be removed. [23:13]
- “There are three conversations to have about any situation with another person; What happened? How do we feel about it? And What Happens Next?” [28:15]
- System observation and pattern recognition: “If you have a process for looking at the future, you can know a whole lot more than you imagine.” [30:19]
- Jonathan’s book, Rogue Waves: “How do I increase my optionality and potential, no matter what happens?” [36:59]
Get access to full transcripts and past episodes at www.MBS.works/podcast
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Resources:
Mentioned Episodes | Ep. 56: What Technology Promises: Azeem Azhar | Ep. 112: Have We Canceled Our Future?: Pascal Finette
Jonathan Brill | Website | LinkedIn | Rogue Waves: Future-Proof Your Business to Survive and Profit from Radical Change
Marshall McLuhan | The Medium Is the Massage: An Inventory of Effects
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