The Future Does Not Fit in the Containers of the Past.
Curated & Categorized.
Every Sunday for 4 years, Rishad has published a post on a different topic in his thought letter “The Future Does Not Fit in the Containers of the Past” which is read by nearly 30,000 people and is available for FREE at https://rishad.substack.com/. Here are the top 100 pieces curated and categorized into 12 categories. Each piece is a five minute read and an entire category is like a self contained book on the subject and takes about an hour to read and will make you more productive and effective!
1. The Future
The future does not fit in the containers of the past. The future comes from the slime and not the heavens. The future threats and opportunities for most firms are outside their current industry definitions. While the future is hard to predict the broad trends are right in front of our eyes if we decide to look. Central to the future is connectedness…from the future of the Internet to the future of Organizations. Ten years ago, this author wrote a piece predicting the next 10 years and got each one right. Now read predictions for the next 10 years…. Glimpse into the future of the Internet and if strategy is “future competitive advantage” we may want to re-think our future strategies given the changes of the past five years.
2. Managing Change
Change sucks but irrelevance is worse. We all must cure IDD (Inner Dinosaur Disease) by slaying our inner dinosaur. Change is easy when planned in the boardroom but then people and their emotions get in the way. Understanding and managing the new talent terrain is what successful companies are focusing on. And one way to thing about dealing with change is to think of yourself and your company as a start-up!
3. Upgrading Our Mental Operating System
The day we stop learning is the day we begin dying. One can learn to learn. The best people do not get defeated they defeat themselves so avoid self-defeat. Seek to understand people including the reality that it is hard to understand people completely. And to grow your self give yourself time by carving out a sacred hour. Let us not confuse data with identity and learn to think broader about the many identities we all have.
4. Enhancing Effectiveness
To be memorable, remembered and to truly persuade one needs to think about “tattoo moments”. Bring one of the 4P’s to a meeting. Learn to be impactful. Learn how to distill a presentation to nine slides.Schedule more meetings versus less. To grow one must also be able to give and receive feedback. There are five keys to making the most of time.
The 4P’s: Perspectives. Point of View. Provocation. Plan of Action.
5. Becoming a Leader
A leader is not the same thing as a boss. A boss is a title that give one a zone of control and the ability to make people genuflect. A leader is a role, and it is about a zone of influence. People follow people. Not titles. If you are a boss be aware of your “Bossy Traits”. Managing today and tomorrow is very different than even five years ago and most people can change to manage at the next level if they want to. But regardless of the era there are 8 timeless management lessons.
6. Re-Thinking Marketing, Media & Creativity
Marketing is being re-invented but we sometimes make it more complex than it need be. All the changes can be reduced to the back of an envelope! The future of media and creativity has been leaking and morphing and is about to take new shapes that will change the balance of power and bring about a new Creative Age. The power of new narratives and storytelling can be seen through the lens of how a new generation of media is complimenting and sometimes supplementing what came before. The potential of metaverses and more will be significant because they satisfy a human need for “God like Power”! and expressing multiple identities. How TikTok unleashed creativity and practices asymmetric warfare to overtake all Meta (FB, Instagram, WhatsApp) properties combined.
The Future of Marketing is People
7. Selling Better
Every Customer, Client and Prospect have the same eight needs. If one knows how to take a photograph one can use the same skills to become a better persuader. Four letters S.A.V.E is all one needs to be better at closing a sale. The people who have impact focus on outcomes, scale and iteration.i
Art of Persuasion: 4 Magical Potions
The Eight Things Clients and Customers Want
8. The Future of Work
We are all going to be the gig workers. In-person interactions will always be a key component of successful work, but offices will not for many industries. Most of what we do in many jobs will be replaced by a machine, but we will not if we learn how to augment the machine or have the machine augment us. The future will not be about “years of experience” but “experiences in a year”! Smart companies recognize they have only one key scalable asset which are its people and the best focus on Employee Joy!
Fractionalized Employment Now!
9. Creating Great Cultures & Future Forward Organizations
Culture does not need a campus, but cults do. To offset “The Great Resignation”, remember that what matters are the factors that drive “The Great Attraction”. Enduring cultures marry “Roots and Wings”. Healthy cultures minimize fear and create an environment where people can call out the turd on the table by noting the brown thing in the middle of the table is not a brownie but a piece of shit! And the best cultures learn how to balance, unite and integrate the varied expertise and differences of the different groups in a company.
10. Managing Careers
Careers will last 50 years, and it is a journey that requires a map, a telescope, a compass and a first aid-kit. A distilled dozen lessons from my forty-year career. There is a simple free nine-word exercise that thousands of people have used over the past two decades to help them get better fitting and satisfying jobs. Before you stay or leave a job you may want to do the exercise “Should I stay? Should I go?”
11. Personal Growth
To grow one must set some time aside for oneself ie sacred hours. There are half a dozen things one can do to grow as a person. Go the extra mile it is never crowded. Success is being able to spend time in the ways that give you joy. One of the best ways to grow is to read a book.
Six Ways to Be and Feel Better
12. Wisdom
If success is the freedom to spend time in ways that give you joy, what is joy and how do we architect it? Life is about learning, love and loss. Generosity is a key to contentment and life satisfaction. Time is all you have everything else is a conveyor belt of distractions from what matters. Dignity is key in a polarized age.
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If you enjoy Rishad’s writing get his best selling book, Restoring the Soul of Business: Staying Human in the Age of Data which has earned rave reviews from The Economist and is described by the esteemed writer and journalist Ken Auletta as “a brilliant how to book, one that belongs on the shelf next to In Search of Excellence. But this book also reaches beyond the business world. It contains more than a few traces of Daniel Kahneman’s Thinking Fast and Slow, sharing universal wisdom”. To learn more about the book and different ways to access it click here: https://rishadtobaccowala.com/book