Deborah M. Collier

Categories
ECONOMY, BUSINESS & COMMERCE FUTURE & HUMANITY LEADERSHIP & GOVERNANCE STRATEGY, INNOVATION & CREATIVITY

Competence and Collaboration Culture – Into the Future

Future Collaboration

The image selected for this post is somewhat controversial, which is intentional as it potentially brought you here, and of course it opens a broader dialogue on ethics and the future. Don’t worry the future is human – we need humanity more than ever, but will we be collaborating with robots? Most likely. Robots and artificial intelligence will have differing roles to humans. As I said in my keynote speech Diversity-of-Things (DoT), “The future is humans + technology + digital + planet”, “Our roles are now changing.” We all need human faces, caring and customer service, and those roles are vitally important. However the manual and functional roles will continue to be taken over by robots, freeing up time for humans to focus on analytical, monitoring, management, caring, communications, strategic and creative skills. Those are the skills of the future.

I’m particulary interested in the human aspect of collaboration, competence and working, and have always been firmly against autocracy, while effective decision-making in leadership remains vital. In 2002, I conducted a piece of original research with the University of London, PriceWaterhouseCoopers and some SMEs. I assessed that my research needed a question on what the optimal culture should be for digitally transformed organisations to be successful. My cross-organisational research concluded that an organisational culture which was predominantly a collaboration and competence culture (value and authority based on subject-matter knowledge and experience) was needed, while also blending some elements of a ‘control culture’ where employee roles and seniority are clearly defined and adhered, with a cultivation and innovation culture where members can produce their own ideas. I believe this rationale is still valid today and will continue into the future. Therefore, Future Culture = Collaboration + Competence + Innovation + Ethical Governance

About the Author

Deborah Collier M.Sc. FRSA is an influential strategic, foresight and futurist leader in business, digital, education and media working on boards in the UK and North America. Described by academics and leaders as an ‘original thinker’, ‘thought-leader’, and ‘economic force’, she is an author and professional keynote speaker with a global audience, major brand following, network and readership of C-Suite leaders and professionals in business, academia, government, media and entertainment. A digital, technology and media entrepreneur, achieving global impact, she developed and implemented a three-pillared model, plan and solution for sustainability (Economy, Social and Environment), a digital governance framework, scalable brands, methodologies for strategic planning and leadership and management programs used by blue-chip organisations around the globe.  A media group CEO, Chair and Non-Executive Director, she is a digital education pioneer, founder and president of industry’s global awarding body Digital Skills Authority.

Categories
ECONOMY, BUSINESS & COMMERCE LEADERSHIP & GOVERNANCE STRATEGY, INNOVATION & CREATIVITY

Strategy in a Turbulent World

Future Strategy
Agile and Lean - Future Strategy

I was recently interviewed by Thinkers360 for their ‘Prominent Thought-Leaders Series’. My passion is strategy – thinking strategically and then leading creatively, looking at scenarios like a high-level map, foreseeing risks, benefits, opportunities, and then coming up with ideas either as business, organisational or marketing strategy, commercial product or for company, national or global solutions, or disaster prevention.  I wanted to highlight this excerpt for those in business.

“As Futurist Leader, you are described as a “Strategic Brain”, what overall advice would you give to organisations for the future?

Technology is moving at hyper-speed, and we are witnessing a huge cultural shift. Organisations should ensure they remain lean with an agile strategy, responding to risks and opportunities quickly. They should also ensure they are future-proof. Yes, we should be thinking about the near-term, but what about 2030, and 2050. What will the typical human be like? Where and how will we be living, communicating and travelling, for example? What opportunities will arise? What challenges will we face, and how will we respond to them?”

Read full interview

Whatever, the organisation, strategy or offering, there are three vital elements that should not be ignored for a successful future:-

Further insights about these elements are available in my articles, talks and other media.

About the Author

Deborah Collier M.Sc. FRSA is an influential strategic, foresight and futurist leader in business, digital, education and media working on boards in the UK and North America. Described by academics and leaders as an ‘original thinker’, ‘thought-leader’, and ‘economic force’, she is an author and professional keynote speaker with a global audience, major brand following, network and readership of C-Suite leaders and professionals in business, academia, government, media and entertainment. A digital, technology and media entrepreneur, achieving global impact, she developed and implemented a three-pillared model, plan and solution for sustainability (Economy, Social and Environment), a digital governance framework, scalable brands, methodologies for strategic planning and leadership and management programs used by blue-chip organisations around the globe.  A media group CEO, Chair and Non-Executive Director, she is a digital education pioneer, founder and president of industry’s global awarding body Digital Skills Authority.

Categories
FUTURE & HUMANITY LEADERSHIP & GOVERNANCE

Are Political Parties Right for the Future?

Future Leaders
Future Leaders

As a strategic thinker, futurist leader and non-political figure, I have a neutral view and interest in modelling for governance and the success of humanity. I am therefore writing from an impartial perspective and point of balance. Politics is about gaining, maximising and maintaining authority, influence and power. Governance is about serving humanity – effective decision-making, leading a nation and it’s relationship with the rest of the world. Unfortunately, evidence has demonstrated that deception and ‘dirty tricks’ are often at the heart of politics, with a portion of unscrupulous types, motivated by self-interest.

I pose a philosophical question – To end corruption and unethical strategy games, is an end to political parties the answer? Should ministers be more like a diverse board of directors with different view points as well as skills – a mix of more left or liberal leaning and more right and conservative leading? With changing parties, the ping-pong between two opposites ‘left’ to ‘right’ has both an unsettling impact and financial cost due to the reversal of previous government’s policies. At a minimum this ‘ping-pong leadership’ as I call it, creates division, as well as limited choice. Has this division been orchestrated for financial gain? Where there is conflict, there’s both conversation and distraction – the ideal climate for increasing media activity or hiding activities.

One of the greatest failings in politics is inequitable funding of party electoral campaigning. Where parties are funded by leaders of brands, oligarchs and other influential figures, this creates a stronger hold and influence over a political party and it’s individual members. The outcome of course is financial gain and other influence for the funders, as well as potential financial gain, power and influence for the politician post public service. One of the greatest concerns is financiers from a nation that pose a security risk to the country of the funded political party. This leverage aids the threat, putting weak leaders in place, in readiness to strike, or leaders that will side with them in a crisis. It is no revelation, that while there are honourably motivated individuals in politics, narcissism is prevalent – those motivated by self-interest – money, power, prestige, status, and authority.

It is rather a bleak view or is it just a reality check? So what about inspiring hope, change and providing solutions? The great American architect Buckminster Fuller said “You never change things by fighting the existing reality. To change something, build a new model, that makes the existing model obsolete”. We can apply that thinking to models in business, politics and governance. Have the governance structures of nations changed that much, despite the accelerating change in culture and human evolution? Are we more aware than ever, of the exploitation and dangers to humanity taking place by unethical leaders, or those that are unduly influenced and controlled (puppets)? So what’s the solution? Solutions start with an idea, and mine could be one that others have considered, but perhaps it’s time for review. Firstly, to avoid unfair advantage, all electoral funding should come from public funding and distributed in equal measure, to carefully vetted and qualifying individuals or parties. Politicians and parties should not be in receipt of any funding externally. There should be a review on whether and how political advertising on social networks and media should be enabled (to avoid unfair or unscrupulous competition). Secondly, the concept of the ‘political party’ should be reviewed, to avoid division, ping-pong leadership and the lack of choice. Potentially, if political parties became an obsolete concept, overall leadership of a country, would be more like a board, but rather than the board voting on the members, the general public elects the members, from a diverse pool of talented, vetted and ethical candidates. A psychological evaluation of an individual’s fitness to govern, with focus on measurement of ability, honesty, integrity, narcissistic and sociopathic tendencies, should be a key vetting element. Ultimately, societies have the choice to continue with the current flow of accepting a force which is too great to change, or to rebuild national governance that is fair and ethical for the future.

About the Author

Deborah Collier is a strategic and futurist leader, working across boards, business and governance in the UK and USA. A global keynote speaker and author, she is a Thinkers360 Global Top 10 Thought-Leader, who is passionate about inspiring a harmonious, ethical and impacting future for all.

Categories
DIGITAL & TECHNOLOGY ECONOMY, BUSINESS & COMMERCE EDUCATION & INFORMATION STRATEGY FUTURE & HUMANITY STRATEGY, INNOVATION & CREATIVITY

Colliding Worlds – Experiential on Steroids

Metaverse - Virtual Worlds
Metaverse background as a futuristic streaming media symbol as virtual eye or eyeball and augmented reality and computer media concept as a 3D render.

In 2021 Meta and Microsoft announced their plans for the Metaverse or Metaverses which are likely to take several years to fully develop and will invite global collaboration and contribution. Anyone with the means, know-how and desire can participate in the Metaverse, either as a developer, brand or individual. In the meantime gaining the competitive edge in 2022 and beyond involves developing and delivering audience journeys that are ‘experiential on steroids’.  Commercial and creative focus are about bringing real objects into the virtual world and virtual objects into the real world.  A brand offering a personalized product with accompanying original digital design in the form of an NFT (non-fungible token), is one commercial possibility. 

As mobile and wearable devices for augmented reality become more accessible with new products launching, these technologies deliver far reaching opportunities for entertainment, leisure, shopping, education, and other information sharing and consumption. Multi-sensory essentials such as smell, taste and touch (haptic) are still in their infancy.  Proprioception (kinaesthesiais), the ability to sense movement, action or location is a vital ongoing area of research, which in the future, will have a powerful impact on entertainment, leisure and education.  In the meantime, spatial awareness technologies such as LiDAR, used for visualising store products in your home, or seeing the complete anatomy in a medical lecture, for example, are more quickly advancing and in commercial use.

Extract: Digital World Predictions 2022

About the Author

Deborah Collier is a strategic and futurist leader in business, digital, media and education. She is founder and President at Digital Skills Authority, a Non-Executive Director and media group CEO. She has delivered digital world and digital business predictions annually for 13-years, which have been featured in a number of national and industry publications.

Categories
DIGITAL & TECHNOLOGY ECONOMY, BUSINESS & COMMERCE EDUCATION & INFORMATION STRATEGY FUTURE & HUMANITY LEADERSHIP & GOVERNANCE

Digital Governance Fast Forward

Digital Governance
Digital Governance

This decade has ignited a number of evolving digital services and products.  Digital and e-business history is already testament to the need for effective governance alongside innovation. However, it often takes years for governments to respond with legislation, while organisations set their own policies or continue without risk management – often at their own peril.  Ethics of course are essential in effective and reputable policy-making, but are not always deployed. Diligent and impacting digital governance is essential for ‘Central Bank Digital Currency’, data and processing, AI, infrastructure and deployment, as well a digital business. While the protection and processing of data is largely regulated around the globe, there is currently no governance for blockchain (a technology providing unique identification of records).  Regulations for cryptocurrency (which is enabled by blockchain) are in their infancy and evolving around the globe.  While regulations to fight fraud are a primary area of digital governance, another more human element has come to the forefront.  Regulations to protect against online harms, have been evolving for some years, but not swiftly enough. With further pressure on the social networks to manage content responsibly or have legal liability, employees are also taking liability and their own protection more seriously.  According to a recent article by BBC News, a TikTok moderator has sued their employer “over psychological trauma due to the requirement to watch and moderate extreme and graphic violence for up to 12-hrs a day.” With the volume of content posted online, Artificial Intelligence has to be the first mechanism for moderation. If we are to avoid psychological harms to humans, we need more intelligent Artificial Intelligence to moderate and block harmful content, before humans moderate a smaller selection further with limited exposure, combined perhaps with more joyful work.  ‘Content Moderator + X’ could be a hybrid role of the future.

Extract: Digital World Predictions 2022

About the Author

Deborah Collier is a strategic and futurist leader in business, digital and education. She is a media group CEO, Non-Executive Director and President of Digital Skills Authority. She developed a ‘Digital Governance Framework‘ which is delivered throughout the organisation’s management and leadership programs.

Categories
EDUCATION & INFORMATION STRATEGY FUTURE & HUMANITY STRATEGY, INNOVATION & CREATIVITY

Human-Centric Strategy – 2022 and Beyond

Harmony
Harmony

Positive communications are vital, but audience is everything. In 2022, enhanced human-centric strategies will be engrained throughout marketing, communications, product and services development and delivery whether these be commercial or governmental. As we navigate the virtual world more confidently, blending real-world with online, industry and government organisations explore how to leverage technology and maximize automation, while balancing and refocusing attention on human interaction, audience engagement and customer experience. Bringing digital into the real-world, rather than focusing entirely on immersing us in the digital world, creating that perfect balance and harmony, missed by so many during the pandemic, will be an exciting challenge. A combination of media, social media and the pandemic has caused an acceleration in humanity. In response to this evolution, human skills such as empathy, cognition and cultural awareness come to the forefront. In addition, promoting positive psychology for both customers and employees will be a productive ingredient of 2022 and beyond.

Extract: Digital World Predictions 2022

About the Author

Deborah Collier is a strategic and futurist leader in business, digital, education and media. She is a President of Digital Skills Authority, a Non-Executive Director and Media Group CEO. With a strong background in digital, in 2016, she was listed in a publications ‘Top 100 Chief Marketing Officers in the World.’

Categories
ECONOMY, BUSINESS & COMMERCE STRATEGY, INNOVATION & CREATIVITY

E-Commerce Businesses Move Home

E-Commerce
E-Commerce

During the pandemic, E-Commerce has been a lifeline for many businesses and indeed new ventures have launched.  However, key challenges with distribution, taxation and import and exports are still prevalent, if not crippling in many parts of the world, with a heavy impact on sales in some countries as a result.  The United Kingdom, a world leader in e-commerce has been heavily impacted by Brexit, and taxation in and with Europe has become unnecessarily complex, particularly with digital products.  Tax rulings for each territory dependent on whether the sale is to a business or a consumer, have also become unworkable for many businesses without the ability and desire to register for VAT in every country sold to, or the investment for e-commerce systems that auto-calculate the relevant sales tax.  These over complex rulings designed to add fairness with taxation exclude many SMEs.  In 2022 and beyond, if governments do not address their sales taxation rules and trade agreements effectively, businesses who wish to sell further than domestically, will need to consider the viability of running an e-commerce or Internet business in their own country. 2022 will see a further flurry of exporting businesses moving to alternative countries around the world.

Extract: Digital World Predictions 2022

About the Author

Deborah Collier is a strategic and futurist leader in business. She is founder and President of international business Digital Skills Authority and has several years experience with digital business and international business strategy. During her career she has advised and taught leaders and teams from Fortune 500 companies and other organisations around the globe.

Categories
ECONOMY, BUSINESS & COMMERCE LEADERSHIP & GOVERNANCE

How will Banks Embrace Digital Currency?

Digital Currency
Central Bank Digital Currencies

The acceptance and use of cryptocurrency has accelerated during the pandemic, and with that the banks motivation to innovate and embrace digital currency rather than fight against the tide. Cryptocurrency is designed to be decentralized and anonymous, which is attractive to those fearing too much power and surveillance by governments on citizens spending, similar to the way tech giants mine user data. Central Banks such as ‘Bank of England’ and ‘Banco De Mexico’, are planning their own Central Bank Digital currency. China has already launched its own CBDC, and ‘Bank of Jamaica’ will be launching their own CBD later this year after a successful pilot in 2021. The impacts are far reaching both economically and for humanity.   What would make a CBDC different to card and digital payments already in existence? CBDC will make payments faster with immediate settlements, and could make payment processing and transaction fees cheaper, while there is also a focus on encouraging innovation and increasing efficiency. Maintaining currency sovereignty, legal and regulatory safeguards such as payment tracking for anti-money laundering and terrorism, are also drivers for central banks own digital currency, which can be distributed through commercial banks without causing too much disruption. CDBC’s could enable financial inclusion for the 1.7-billion adults around the globe who are without a bank account, either through digital wallets, or legislation to ensure everyone has a bank account of some sort. 

Through monetary policy committees and strong economic governance, financial stability, cyber resilience and energy efficiency will be achieved, CBDC can complement traditional currency and co-exist with commercial bank money and bank notes, without harming the economy, banking or citizens.  Choice will as always be key for global citizens in 2022 and beyond.

Extract: Digital World Predictions 2022

About the Author
Deborah Collier is a Strategic and Futurist Leader is in business, digital, education and business with career experience in governance, banking e-treasury and commerce. She is President of Digital Skills Authority, and has delivered her annual digital world and digital business predictions for 13-years.

Categories
ECONOMY, BUSINESS & COMMERCE EDUCATION & INFORMATION STRATEGY FUTURE & HUMANITY LEADERSHIP & GOVERNANCE

Positive Influence in Leadership – The Power of Trust versus Incentives

Trust
Trust

Influence is a vital ingredient in all forms of leadership, whether this is to influence progress, or decision-making. Influence through trust is necessary to steer other leaders, employees, partners, clients or the general public through a difficult change, as a result of either positive opportunity or crisis.  If we explore incentives in sales and marketing, incentives are helpful, but without trust in a brand, incentives will not have the desired impact, and customers are more likely to buy from a brand or person they trust, regardless of whether there is a small price difference.  

The power of trust can be applied to all forms of influence and is essential in governance. Governance often involves difficult decision-making, and change management forms part of any leader’s strategy to engage an audience in what they believe is in the collective interests of an organisation, nation or even the world. 

Trust is about honesty, integrity and transparency, as well as competence, wisdom and ability. Once any form of organisation loses trust, leadership is lost and no amount of incentives entices an audience to collaborate.  Education and communication are absolutely critical in effective trust building and influence, particularly during crisis or unsettling change. Informing and educating with honesty, integrity and helpful factual information, empowers an audience to make informed and comfortable decisions. When trust is gone, leadership has ultimately failed, and authoritarianism becomes the unwelcome ambassador. Compliance with objection or ultimate rejection ensues and while a crisis may or may not be averted, trust, audience and members are gone and may never return.

About the Author

Deborah Collier is a Strategic and Futurist Leader in Business, Education, Digital and Media. A group CEO, global Keynote Speaker, Non-Executive Director and leader of a global publisher and awarding body, she was listed 2016 in a publication’s ‘Top 100 Most Influential Chief Marketing Officers in the World’ as a joint CEO / CMO. Deborah is passionate about positive leadership, strategy and good governance.

Categories
DIGITAL & TECHNOLOGY ECONOMY, BUSINESS & COMMERCE EDUCATION & INFORMATION STRATEGY FUTURE & HUMANITY

Diversity-of-Things (DoT)

dots

The ‘Digital Renaissance’ or the ‘4th Industrial Revolution’ catapulted by the Pandemic, has broadened individual skills needs, but it’s not just about digital and technology. Social networks have brought social responsibility to the forefront, as our awareness and interest in everything around us broadens. We are witnessing a cultural shift (particularly in the younger generation), with regards to the environment, social responsibility, government and political awareness, both nationally and on a global scale. Employees are becoming stakeholders in their organisations regardless of whether the business model is that of a partnership like John Lewis Partnership. The realisation from junior level and above, that the success of their organisation directly impacts their own employment or that their behaviour on social networks and outside of work also has implications (positive or risky). Businesses are integrating more and more with humanity and social media is the glue. Analytical and cognitive skills, the addition of digital skills to existing roles, as well as the ability to make connections between decision-making and events is also something to be nurtured. This new paradigm which I call the ‘Diversity-of-Things’ (DoT) is something I will be expanding on in my upcoming talks on the skills revolution, current and future skills.

Keynote Speech
Watch the video of Deborah’s keynote speech at The Business Show’s Retrain Expo.
Diversity-of-Things (DoT) – Skills Evolution, the Future Human and Work

About the Author

Deborah Collier is a strategic and futurist leader in business, education, media and digital. She is a President at Digital Skills Authority, a media group CEO, writer and global keynote speaker.