ED Futures Newsletter

Dear ED Futures Reader:

Welcome to the start of the new year!

I have spent some time assessing developments in 2005 and thinking about 2006. Some of my articles in the past week attempt to point to a direction for the new year. You may want to read these 8 articles: Economic Outlook; How Manufacturing CFOs See 2006 Shaping Up; Book Review: New Check E-mail in the Morning; Delegating: Leadership Basics; Welcome to 2006; U.S. Economic Outook for 2006; Does Optimism Make a Difference?; and World Future Society's Latest Forecast.

Upon deeper reflection, I believe we need to pay close attention to the role of "wild cards," or unthinkable events, which occur and re-shape our world and sense of reality. See the list below of major developments shaping our world over the past five years.

In short, expect the unexpected! This is not a time for incremental thinking. Work at wrapping your mind around a larger piece of reality.

Look back at what has happened in the past five years. Tell me the world is not changing at record speeds and in directions we could have never imagined.

2001

9/11 terrorist attacks occur in the United States in NY City, Washington, DC, and Pennsylvania.

New reports point to growing threat of global warming. Battle lines are drawn among various "camps" looking at the issue.

Cloning research gets increased public attention with new developments. Battle lines are drawn around the issue.

2002

U.S. steps up homeland security with an increased number of terrorist attempts and reports.

Terrorism grows in Bali, Russia, and elsewhere around the world.

Enron, Arthur Andersen, Tyco, Qwest, Global Crossing, ImClone, and Adelphia, scandals surface, shaking public confidence in Corporate America.

Priest-child molestation issues brought out into public. The Catholic Church attempts to tightly "manage" communication on the issue, but the news media brings the issue out into public view.

The battle over human reproductive cloning and stem cell research takes shape.

2003

The Iraq War commences and the bloodshed increases.

North Korea postures on nuclear profileration.

Reports on priest-child molestation grow, and the Catholic Church is forced to come clean on how widespread the issue is.

More U.S. companies announce problems with their financial reporting. President Bush and Congress reluctantly pass legislation to contain the problem.

U.S. companies step up outsourcing of business and jobs to offshore sources. Numerous reports are published talking about the possible impacts of this global business practice on the US economy.

U.S. employment grows at a trickle.

U.S. space shuttle, Columbia, explodes, killing all seven astronauts on board.

Californians throw out Gov. Gray Davis and Arnold Schwarzenegger begins as the state's new governor.

Scientists uncover the fossil of a new species of flying dinosaur in northeastern China thought to have existed 120 million years ago.

NASA produces a high-resolution map that captured the oldest light in the universe. It provides some of the most important cosmological discoveries in years.

2004

Terrorist attack in Spain, killing 200 people.

More terrorism in Russia. 1,200 school children taken hostage. Nearly 400 die.

Enormous tsunami devastates Asia; 200,000 killed and millions left homeless.

Florida hit by hurricanes Bonnie (Aug. 12) and Charley (Aug. 13), and Hurricane Ivan ravages U.S. south (Sept. 15). Hurricane Jeanne hits Florida (Sept. 26).

U.S. corporations continue to offshore jobs to India, China, and other world location, blaming American workers and communities for their declining profits.

U.S. sees continued slow growth in jobs across the year, although some improvement comes in the final annual numbers.

Scientists in South Korea announce they had created 30 human embryos by cloning and had removed embryonic stem cells from them. (Update: This research has now been determined to be fradulent.)

Australian and Indonesian archaeologists unearth skeletons of tiny people who are being called Homo floresiensis.

2005

Hurricane Katrina slams into the U.S. Gulf Coast on Aug. 29, destroying towns in Mississippi and Louisiana, displacing a million people, and killing more than 1,000. Reconstruction costs estimated at $75-100 billion. Debates erupt over who should pay the bill.

London terrorist bombings occur, killing 52 and injuring 700 people.

A massive earthquake strikes the Kashmir region with more than 81,000 people were killed and 3 million left homeless. India suffered about 1,300 casualties.

8,000 Israeli settlers were evacuated from the Gaza Strip, which had been occupied by Israel for the previous 38 years.

A number of criminal investigations roil the GOP. Resignations and charges occur across the Party.

Offshoring continues by U.S. companies. Battle lines are drawn over whether the business practice is good or bad for the U.S. economy.

U.S. employment picture brightens some as 2005 comes to an end.

Oil companies pocket windfall profits from the 2005 energy scare.

Paleontologists discovered the existence of soft tissue in a 68-million-year-old Tyrannosaurus rex fossil.

In 2001 Matt Nagle, a 25-year-old from Weymouth, Mass., was stabbed in a fight that severed his spinal cord. Paralyzed from the neck down, he lost even the ability to breathe on his own. But over the last year, this quadriplegic has performed a seemingly supernatural feat: he can control machines through his thoughts. Nagle is one of the pioneers in the exploding field of neuro-cybernetics.

What lies ahead in 2006? Certainly many of the major issues that faced us in the past five years will be carried over into 2006. While the U.S. economy is expected to see relatively favorable growth from a GDP standpoint, financial worries will intensify as we look at how to cover the costs of the many natural disasters, wars, corporate scandals, and other events rocking the nation and the world.

It is important for us to remember that we live in a highly connected world, and therefore what happens in one part of the world has significant implications for other places across the globe. We should be thinking in more sustainable terms about our world, our health, our financial and economic security, our science, and other aspects of our lives.

I wish each of you well in 2006.

Sincerely,

Don Iannone
ED Futures Publisher
Email: dtia@don-iannone.com
Tel: 440.449.0753
6838 Deepwood Lane
Mayfield Village, OH 44143