Judy Nagel, Envision Board and Upward Mobility Signals Team
When you think of a drone, how high do you imagine it going, and how long do you imagine it staying in the air? Did you realize that the new “pseudo-satellite” drones can soar to heights of more than 60,000 feet and stay up there for months? That’s the report from Alistair MacDonald in The Wall Street Journal, which labeled such drones the “innovation of the week” recently.
(more…)By Phil Hauck, Envision Board President
Our first Network Cohort held its second meeting … and they know that ChatGPT will be on the agenda each meeting for quite some time. Participants recounted how they are using it so far, mainly to write contracts and publicity material. One member used ChatGPT to develop a service contract, needing only a few adjustments to make it workable; it saved them $4,000 in attorney costs. Another used it to develop the computer code for a new application, cutting coding time by 75%. And still another member of the cohort uses it daily, along with DALL-E (for images), as part of graphic marketing communications efforts. And yes, members are alert to bad information that might work its way in.
(more…)By Phil Hauck, Board President
Post-Workshop, you are likely to need some advice or even ongoing consulting to help you implement the Strategic Foresight techniques you’ve learned, to make them more impactful within your team or organization. Envision offers that support. And we start during Garry Golden’s workshop! We now meet with participants after the second class session to make sure they’re using the tools correctly, making optimal use of Diigo and creating an effective Domain Map with good key words to use with Google Alerts or ChatGPT. Then, after the SF Workshop concludes, we meet with participants again to ascertain exactly how they want to ingrain what they’ve learned into their organization, and we offer to help them do that. That follow-up help comes in two ways: Advising and Consulting.
(more…)Heidi Selberg, Envision Board Member and Upward Mobility Signals Team
Our team’s previous reports have shown the importance of public policy in supporting upward mobility. Judy Nagel’s reports have outlined international comparisons, demonstrating that several government policies related to childcare, health, and other matters are critical to those countries’ higher rates of upward mobility. But what if upward mobility in the U.S. is not accelerating because our institutions are becoming weaker?
(more…)Amanda Johnson, Executive Director, Howe Community Resource Center
One cannot deny that the COVID-19 pandemic has divided our country and significantly reshaped our lives. Its effects on children’s health and well-being have become a great concern. Being that I am in the education and mental health space as the Executive Director of the Howe Community Resource Center, I can’t ignore the blatant signals that, although we are no longer in a pandemic, the effects will last long beyond this generation, touching generations to come.
(more…)By Noel Halvorsen, Envision Board Member and Housing & Safety Signals Team
Park Hotels and Resorts, the owner of two of San Francisco’s largest (Hilton operated) hotels, has stopped making mortgage payments in the “best interest’ of shareholders. Slow recovery from the pandemic, a weak convention calendar, lagging return to office numbers, and concerns over “street conditions” (the neighborhood has seen some high-end retailers pull out due to concerns about homelessness, street crime, and drugs).
While one might be tempted to point to the street conditions as a primary driver, it looks to this foresight analyst that the damage is more related to high market costs, and a slow return to normal in terms of room bookings. Choosing to default on a $725 million loan at two of the three largest hotels in a major city can’t be an easy decision. This could be a signal of central city real estate problems across the country as offices sit vacant, conventions continue to sputter in hybrid formats, and homeless numbers swell in the face of inflation and unreachable housing expenses. Read about it here.
Enjoy the July 2023 Horizons, Envision’s bi-monthly newsletter. Board members and a Strategic Foresight graduate describe the application of Strategic Foresight to Catholic education; Green Bay’s designation as the best place to live in the US; early childhood development and upward mobility; and combining Innovation, Design, Engineering, Application and Skills (IDEAS) with Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts and Mathematics (STEAM).
By Phil Hauck, Envision Board President
When U.S. News and World Report asserts that Green Bay, Wisconsin, is the best place to live in the U.S., that’s a pretty sound recommendation, right? But what if there’s even more to that story? What if we discover that young Green Bay professionals are getting a firm foundation here, then going out into the world to get a start on success – and bringing those amazing successes right back to Green Bay? Well, we have! Recently I attended the NEW North Summit at Lambeau Field, and I heard presentations by individuals from both New York and Los Angeles who have brought their cutting-edge operations right back to Green Bay!
(more…)By Beverly French, Envison Board Member and Arts, Culture & Entertainment Signals Team
“If you had two sheets of newspaper and ten inches of tape, how tall a structure could you build with them? ”
That’s the sort of question Rutgers Prep lower and middle school students are asked every week in JoAnn Miller’s STEAM class. Combined with the IDEAS program (Innovation, Design, Engineering, Application and Skills), Ms. Miller’s class and others at Rutgers Prep are meant to give students in grades one through eight opportunities to explore their regular classroom work in a teamwork scenario, using problem solving, observation, experimentation and creativity.
Judy Nagel, Envision Board member and Upward Mobility Signals Team
Here in the nation with more gun violence than any other on earth, Americans constantly ask about the root cause of gun violence. The answer is “mental health.” So how are we doing with that? The CDC identifies early childhood as the period in which mental health is largely determined, starting shortly after birth (with some influence by prenatal conditions).
(more…)