A rapid and massively disruptive shift from centralized to distributed organizations has already begun. But current leadership practices were designed for large, centralized organizations, making them increasingly obsolete. Bob Johansen, who has been projecting future trends from Silicon Valley since 1968, outlines five literacies leaders need to develop to cope with this brave new world.Johansen says leaders need the literacy of projecting themselves into the future and "looking backwards" to make sure they are preparing for potential new developments. They have to cultivate the literacy of voluntarily engaging with their fear in a safe way, using simulations and gaming, so they can immerse themselves in the things they're worried about and deal with them. Distributed leadership is a third vital literacy-leaders need to know how to guide organizations that have no center, grow from the edges, and can't be controlled. In a globalized world they must master multimedia leadership-the literacy of having presence and influence even when they're not physically present. And finally, to stay on top of all this, they need the literacy of creating positive energy: leaders have to be extremely fit, physically and mentally, to keep their own energy and that of their organizations high to cope with this era of extreme disruption. Johansen presents dramatic and mind-expanding examples of how forward-looking organizations are developing these literacies and offers readers sage advice on how to cultivate them.

Sensing the Future to Compete in the Present Offers a proven approach for making sense out of future challenges and devising positive responses, using methods developed by the respected Institute for the Future Features examples of how organizations like Procter & Gamble, Disney, Reuters, UPS, and the Centers for Disease Control have put the approach into practice Includes the institute's ten-year forecast of trends, challenges, and opportunitiesThese days, every leader struggles with a paradox: you can't predict the future, but you have to be able to make sense of it to thrive. In the age of the Internet, everyone knows what's new, but to succeed you have to be able to sort out what's important, devise strategies based on your own point of view, and get there ahead of the crowd.Bob Johansen shares techniques the Institute for the Future has been refining for nearly forty years to help leaders navigate what, borrowing a term from the Army War College, he calls the VUCA world: a world characterized by volatility, uncertainty, complexity, and ambiguity. As the institute's ten-year forecast makes clear, leaders now face fewer problems with neat solutions and more dilemmas: recurring, complex, messy, and puzzling situations. Get There Early lays out the institute's three-step Foresight to Insight to Action Cycle that will allow readers to sense, make sense of, and win with dilemmas. Johansen offers specific techniques, ranging from storytelling to simulation gaming, as well as real-world examples to help readers turn the VUCA world on its head through creative use of vision, understanding, clarity, and agility. This book offers hope for leaders facing the constant tension - a dilemma in itself - between judging too soon and deciding too late.

We are in a time of disruptive leadership change. In a VUCA world - one characterized by volatility, uncertainty, complexity, and ambiguity - traditional leadership skills won't be enough, noted futurist Bob Johansen argues. Drawing on the latest ten-year forecast from the Institute for the Future - the only futures think tank ever to outlive its forecasts - this powerful book explores the external forces that are shaking the foundations of leadership and unveils ten critical new skills that will be required in the future, skills that you can learn. In this second edition Johansen is joined by the prestigious Centre for Creative Leadership. CCL's contributions help readers understand the new leadership skills by linking them to existing skills, and they provide analytics and exercises to help readers develop them. This edition has been updated throughout, with a new ten-year forecast and new examples, and incorporates the lessons Johansen has leaned about applying the new leadership skills in the three years since the first edition appeared. In addition, Johansen deals with two new forces that are shaping the future. The first is the "digital natives," or people 15 years and younger who have grown up in a completely digital world. The second is cloud-based computing, which will enable new forms of connection, collaboration and commerce and will greatly facilitate reciprocity-based innovation - giving away to get more - which Johansen sees as the biggest innovation opportunity in history.