Technology Revolution: The Future of Now

Remember the TV sitcom "Who's The Boss?" (ABC TV 1984 – 1992) It's time to ask the question again! The Buzz 1: Everyone will be a leader in the workplace in 2030. Work will thrive in teams, not with dictators. The Chief of Work will set the culture in the organization. All workers at all levels will use robotic helpers like Siri or Alexa, for incoming email, scheduling meetings, creating spreadsheets. [simplilearn.com, studies by CBRE and Genesis, WSJ report] The Buzz 2: Being a leader rather than a boss is more critical, especially during times of unpredictable change. In a 2016 Fidelity study, many millennials would be willing to take a significant pay cut if it meant a better job environment. In a 2019 Robert Half study, nearly half of the professionals surveyed reported leaving a job because of a bad boss. [coachmonique.com] The Buzz 3: "The time of the heroic, egocentric leader— the dominant, typically male leader who knows everything, who gives direction to everybody and sets the pace, whom everybody follows because this person is so smart and intelligent and clever — is over. We need 'altrocentric' leaders who focus on others, listen, are intellectually curious and emotionally open, and have empathy." [washingtonpost] We'll ask Vanessa Egli at Celonis, Bill Jensen at SimplerWork.com, Scott Dust, Ph.D. at Cloverleaf, and Matt Krentz at BCG for their take on The Future of Work and Technology: Who's The [Your] Boss in 2025??

The Buzz 1: Retailers expect 17.8% or $158 billion of merchandise sold during the 2022 holiday season will be returned, according to National Retail Federation. [digitalcommerce360.com] The Buzz 2: Retail returns jumped to an average of 16.6% in 2021 versus 10.6% in 2020, according to a survey by the National Retail Federation and Appriss Retail. That adds up to more than $761 billion of merchandise…in unwanted purchases that come back to retailers' stores and warehouses and become a headache for companies that must decide whether they can resell those items, get them written off by the manufacturer or if they must take the loss. The average rate of returns for online purchases was 20.8% — up from 18.1% in 2020. [cnbc.com] The Buzz 3: Retail in the Age of Instinct. Trends shaping CPG and retail organizations include 'Optimized Reality': CPG and retail companies are using data and digital technologies to tailor experiences, services, products, and promotions to the individual and shift from maximizing supply chains to personalizing demand chains. [www.genpact.com] We'll ask Praful Karanth, Victoria Wieck, Matt Laukaitis, Navjit Bhasin and Oliver Stocks for their take on The Future of Retail and Technology: How Many Happy Returns?

We're living 'on the edge', but in ways you might not be aware of: edge computing. The Buzz 1: Edge computing means putting processing power, software services, and data as close as possible to end users – like you – where the speed of light is still too slow for data packets traveling from server to server across thousands of miles of fiber. It's also less exposed to cyberattack and less prone to breaches. The Buzz 2: Edge computing is used to create smarter buildings, cities, work spaces, retail experiences, digital wind farms, and factory floors. Intelligent edge devices include smartphones, smart home bots, smart watches, in-hospital patience monitoring, medical instruments, cloud gaming, Wall Street trading tools, and autonomous vehicles. The Buzz 3: An appetizing use case: farms. Moisture sensors embedded in the soil tell farmers where and when to water. Drones fly over fields to spot pest infestations. Smart harvesters use computer vision and AI to separate wheat from chaff as they plow. Precision agriculture in rural areas relies on 5G connections and edge computing devices. Your next meal will likely be brought to you by technology. We'll ask Eric Simone at ClearBlade, Don DeLoach at Rocket Wagon Venture Studios, Jeff Kimmel at Elipsa and Jason Shepherd at Zededa for their take on The Future of Sensors on The Edge: What's In It For You and for Society?

The Buzz 1: "In the 19th century, inventors were heroes … Their ideas helped drag humanity from agrarian poverty to manufactured plenty. These days, though, inventor-superstars, while not absent, are fewer and farther between." [economist.com] The Buzz 2: "While we've had our fair share of inventive breakthroughs in the past that have changed the world, the dazzling and world-shaking inventions of the future will change the world in even stranger and greater ways." [bigthink.com] The Buzz 3: "There's a way to do it better … find it." [Thomas A. Edison] The Buzz 4: Professor Philip Brainard [played by Robin Williams in Flubber, 1997 American sci-fi comedy], a mad scientist developing a new energy source to save his college from closure, accidentally creates a sentient green goo substance with enormous elasticity and kinetic energy that bounces and is difficult to control. His robot assistant Weebo classifies it as flying rubber" aka Flubber. We'll ask modern inventors Veronica Vargas, Pat Daily, Tammie Sykes and Carol Novello for their take on Your Great Idea: The Future of Inventors, Inventing and Technology.

Looking ahead to 2030: How will we work? How will we get around? What will we eat? How will we dress? How safe will our privacy be? Will we all be space travelers? What old and new challenges will we face? The Buzz 1: The top seven emerging future technology booms that will redefine the future and the world we live in by 2030: More AI companies. Growth of self-driving cars. More robots doing manufacturing jobs. Smart clothing embedded with Bluetooth chips. Space elevators. Pervasive cloud computing. Growth in the augmented, virtual, and mixed reality optics and display markets. [unboxingstartups.com/7-emerging-technologies-that-will-revolutionize-the-world-by-2030] The Buzz 2: Advanced farming will tell us exactly where our food is coming from. On-demand ecosystem of vehicles with different form factors. Almost every occupation will still have tasks machines will find very difficult to do. [www.bosch.com/stories/vision-2030] We'll ask Rik Ferguson at Trend Micro, Colin Dunn at Fend Incorporated, Jon Clay at Trend Micro and Mike Schroeder at 3 Territory Solutions for their take on Our Cyber Future In 2030: Will The Livin' Be Easy?

The Buzz 1: Grateful people feel more optimistic and happy, better mitigate aversive experiences, and have stronger interpersonal bonds. Gratitude interventions have been shown to result in improved sleep, more frequent exercise, and stronger cardiovascular and immune systems. [psywb.springeropen.com] The Buzz 2: Children spend an average of 53 hours per week with digital media — video games, social media, reality TV, exposure to violence, virtual connections that replace face-to-face friendships – which researchers fear may be causing a decline in empathy. [doinggoodtogether.org] The Buzz 3: Expressing gratitude can positively change your brain. It boosts dopamine and serotonin, the neurotransmitters in the brain that improve your mood immediately, giving you those positive feelings of pleasure, happiness, and well-being. [healthcare.utah.edu] The Buzz 4: Gratitude apps will help you improve your mood by focusing on the good things in your life. [makeuseof.com] We'll ask Karen Gibson, Deslynn Jaquias, Sandy Davies and Sarah Klaiber for their take on The Future of Gratitude, Attitude, Mental Health and Technology.

The Buzz 1: Wine tourism —aka oenotourism, enotourism, vinitourism— lures wine lovers to vineyards, wineries, cellars, and museums dedicated to wine. The wine tourism global market size is expected to more than triple by 2030 to ~29.6B euros. (statista.com) The Buzz 2: According to a late-2020 www.statista.com survey, wine tourists are mainly casual wine tasters rather than wine geeks. The Buzz 3: People in Portugal consume more wine than any other country worldwide, with an annual per capita consumption of 52 liters in 2020. Next is Italy: 47 liters per capita. The Buzz 4: Decanter Magazine publishes wine travel guides to ?Italy, ?South Africa, ?Europe and the UK. Wwinepaths.com/ organizes luxury wine tours, intimate group trips and wine holidays around the world. Winemag.com reports on wine travel from touring the historic underground caves of Champagne to playing winemaker for a day in California's Napa Valley. We'll ask Bill Newman, Beth Kaczmarek, Christian Oggenfuss, and Brenda Boudreaux for their take on The Future of Wine Culture, Wine Tourism and Technology: L'Chaim!

The Buzz 1: "Privacy and security are those things you give up when you show the world what makes you extraordinary." (Margaret Cho, stand-up comedian) The Buzz 2: Millions of people are unaware of and uninformed about how their personal information is being used, collected or shared in our digital society. Data Privacy Week aims to inspire dialogue and empower individuals and companies to take action. (staysafeonline.org/data-privacy-week) The Buzz 3: "In the next three years, the value of data will increase, making it even more valuable than it is today. The more efficiently you store your data, the more benefits your business will see." (Thomas Harrer, CTO, IBM Systems Hardware Sales in Europe) The Buzz 4: "Digital freedom stops where that of users begins... digital evolution must no longer be offered to a customer in trade-off between privacy and security. Privacy is not for sale, it's a valuable asset to protect." (Stephane Nappo, Global Head, Information Security, Société Générale International Banking) The Buzz 5: "Federal Trade Commission's Consumer Sentinel Network Data Book: The most common categories for 2021 complaints were identity theft, imposter scams…… 406,000+ people reported someone submitted a fraudulent government document under their name."(consumeraffairs.com) We'll ask Mike Audi, Tim Drisdelle, Shane Faria and Bingxu Ren for their take on Your Data Everywhere: Is Privacy in Your Future?

The Buzz 1: Drones are a transformative technology that, over the next decade, will change in ways you likely never imagined… Similar to Electronic Automobiles, drones offer another important option in fending off greenhouse gasses and becoming carbon neutral. (forbes.com/sites/forbestechcouncil/2021/06/30) The Buzz 2: Google announced on Oct 6, 2021 that it has started drone deliveries straight from a shopping mall directly to customers' homes…The all-time record? Two minutes, 47 seconds.…Wing reached the 100,000 delivery milestone in August 2021, becoming the largest residential drone delivery service in the world. (forbes.com/sites/johnkoetsier/2021/10/06) The Buzz 3: The global drone industry is projected to grow 12.3% annually, nearing $41B by 2027, according to Brandessence Market Research. Just a few years ago, drones were still considered science fiction. (money.usnews.com/investing) We'll ask Chuck Byers, Sandra Formenton, Ryan Walsh and Pharns Genece for their take on The Future of Drones: Landing on a Porch or Planet Near You Soon? – Part 2.

The Buzz 1: It's easier to write about a period you've lived through, but what do you do when everyone who lived during that time is long gone?…The obvious first place to start is with non-fiction books. (Kat Clay) The Buzz 2: Historical nonfiction is a broad category that depicts historical, real-life events…literary nonfiction, narrative nonfiction, creative nonfiction overlap with historical nonfiction. (Masterclass staff) The Buzz 3: Historical fiction can be a tricky genre to master. If you haven't done your homework it won't feel authentic but…no one wants to read a novel that feels like a school history lesson… don't chase accuracy too hard. (Hannah Kohler) The Buzz 4: Start with historical nonfiction. Poach bibliographies. Fall down the Google/Pinterest black hole, then dig yourself out. Read historical fiction…carefully…Get your (virtual) hands on memoirs and documents. (Lydia Kang) We'll ask authors Brad Borkan, Ursula Wong, Sarah Smith and Sharon Yang for their take on "The Future of Historical Research and Technology: Reading The Past."