The Consultant School

How do you have an active influence over your future?

Did you know that you really can play a part in creating the kind of future for yourself that you could previously only imagine?

Towards the end of last week's episode, Ray began talking about his concept of the Four Approaches to the Future, as it relates to transformation- both for individuals and for organizations. On this episode we focus on what we call the Four Approaches to the Future. This is a concept that Ray has used for year and has daily application for everyone. These are theoretical tools that have a practical application for every individual. Listen in today to find out how you can get unstuck and shift your approach to the future to one that you'd really prefer to have.

The Four Approaches to the Future is a really powerful tool. It forms a framework for the way that you look at the world and for the way that you make choices and decisions in your life. We're really excited to be sharing this with you today because it can be used by individuals looking to transform and change their approach to life, and also by organizations, to help them to dig deep and think about the way that they intend to approach the future. Listen in today to find out all about The Four Approaches to the Future and how they can really help you to transform your life, or your organization.

Show Highlights:

• Ray gives an overview of The Four Approaches to the Future.
• How the Four Approaches to the Future can help in dealing with change.
• Ray explains that the first approach is reactive, based on stimulus-response.
• A reactionary response is a very common way of dealing with change.
• The first approach may be the most important approach because its outcome is survival, but it has its limitations.
• The second approach, called the responsive approach, is similar to the first approach.
• The difference between the responsive and reactive approaches is a pause.
• The importance of the quality of the pause that precedes a response.
• The third approach is the pro-active approach.
• The pro-active approach is anticipating the future before it arrives so that you will be ready to deal with it.
• The inventive approach is the fourth approach to the future.
• The fourth approach is based on the assumption that we can influence the future by envisioning it and then acting on what we envision.
• Looking at the percentage of your time that you give to each of the four responses, realizing that they all have value.
• The proactive and the inventive approaches are both strategic in nature, whereas the reactive and the responsive approaches are operational.
• The cyclical nature of the process.
• How having a vision can start changing your reactions.
• The change takes place in our actions.
• How Ray makes use of The Four Approaches to the Future when working in an organizational context.
• Ray shares a few stories about how some organizations have used the four approaches to help them to initiate change.

Links:

You can find out more about the work Ray does at www.thegenysysgroup.com

You can find Amy at www.theartofpoweringdown.com

Our online course for Strategic Futuring will be released soon!

Welcome to the show where we discuss how to transform and share strategies for organizational and personal transformation!

In our this conversation, we spoke about the idea of choosing a life for yourself and owning your own future. Our observation is that people often don't do that. Perhaps the reason for that is that they just don't know how. So today we will be talking about a process that Ray has developed over decades, called Strategic Futuring. Listen in to find out how this helpful strategy can assist you in taking charge of your own future.

Strategic Futuring is a process that Ray created and on the show today he shares an overview of the process and why it works. He also explains how it can be used by people to help them to own their life and their future. This episode will have proven techniques that can help you begin to own your own life and become the author of your own story.

Show Highlights:

• Ray explains what Strategic Futuring is.
• What it means to treat the future as fact, and not as hope.
• Why hope gives people a reason to persist.
• Ray's notion of 'positive paranoia'.
• A story of how Ray, unknowingly at the time, used Strategic Futuring to create his vision.
• The importance of the kind of language you use.
• A five-step-process to becoming clear about your vision for the future.
• Creating a dynamic, renewable, strategic plan for the future.
• Living life in a very different way.
• Ray's key learning for today's session.

Resources:

You can find out more about the work Ray does at www.thegenysysgroup.com

You can find Amy at www.theartofpoweringdown.com

Our online course for Strategic Futuring will be released soon!

Join How to Transform co-hosts Amy Hoppock and Ray Rood to learn why they decided to start a podcast and what they hope to accomplish from the shows. As proponents of questioning and curiosity in learning, any transformation that takes place always starts here.

Ray realized early on that he learns through asking questions. He used to require his students come to class armed with questions. Organizational transformation models utilized by The Genysys Group are so effective for teams, but they also work for individuals. Over the next few episodes, Amy and Ray unpack each aspect of the transformational model.

Show Highlights:

• Learn what transformation looks like
• Ray's ultimate career goal prior to getting into organizational development
• Transformation development started out by looking at human development and student development.
• Grow requires doing something different or what some would call radical change.
• The rules for how we operate in society are changing.
• The 9 dot exercise and how it works
• Unfolding the stories of transformation is the goal of the podcast.

Links:

Connect with Amy at www.theartofpoweringdown.com

Connect with Ray at www.thegenysysgroup.com