Summary

The website content discusses the importance of human talent in creating the future through a multi-faceted approach involving scholarship, entrepreneurship, citizenship, stewardship, leadership, and partnership.

Abstract

The article emphasizes the critical role of human talent in shaping the future by continuously learning, adapting, and innovating. It suggests that educational institutions must evolve to equip individuals with the necessary skills to navigate a rapidly changing, knowledge-based society. The text highlights the need for a paradigm shift in education to focus on creating capacity and capability for new competitive advantages in a VUCA (volatile, uncertain, complex, ambiguous) world. It argues for a learning curriculum that goes beyond solving past problems, encouraging individuals to become lifelong learners who can invent new ideas and products, thus creating uncontested markets and embracing new customers. The article outlines six "ships" – Scholarship, Entrepreneurship, Citizenship, Stewardship, Leadership, and Partnership – as the guiding principles for nurturing innovative mindware and ensuring that human talent has a meaningful impact on businesses, communities, and society.

Opinions

The author believes that the future is shaped by rational thought and civilized modes of appreciation, drawing on the philosophies of Alfred North Whitehead and the statements of Winston Churchill.
It is opined that the acceleration of globalization demands a radical rethinking of education to prepare younger generations for the challenges of the knowledge era.
The article conveys that human resources must be adaptable to constant dynamic change, requiring a shift towards becoming lifelong learners.
There is a strong emphasis on the importance of learning institutions reaching beyond their traditional boundaries to maintain relevance in the context of knowledge application.
The text suggests that it is increasingly important for individuals to "learn to learn" and develop social competencies to prepare for future challenges and job markets.
The author posits that learning mastery should focus on analytical and problem-solving skills, as well as interpersonal and communication skills, to work effectively in diverse teams.
The article expresses the view that creating possible future worlds involves cross-disciplinary and multi-disciplinary approaches within the structure of knowledge inquiry.
It is argued that no single person can quickly identify and engage with the strategic operating environment alone, making collaboration and partnership essential.
The author quotes Lee Kuan Yew to underscore the idea that intelligent individuals must contribute to the well-being of their fellow humans, implying that social impact is the ultimate goal of scholarship and learning.

A 6-Ship Journey to Create Possible Futures

Changing the World before the World Changes you

”The task of human talent”, to paraphrase the philosopher Alfred North Whitehead, “is the creation of the future, so far as rational thought, and civilized modes of appreciation, can affect the issue”. One can also recall Winston Churchill in 1943 saying that “the empires of the future are the empires of the mind” (Speech at Harvard University, 6 September 1943).

The capacity of human talent unleashes dynamic energies that enrich the person and provide the necessary innovations and processes to entire communities and the society at large by continually creating and inventing new futures.

The emergent realities of rapidly-evolving, knowledge-based futures accelerated by globalization towards a more competitive and challenging world will demand a radical re-think about how we educate our younger generations. Institutions of learning need to respond to the challenges of the knowledge era by re-visiting, re-examining and to strengthen their roles in the areas of knowledge dissemination, creation, and application.

Nations need to develop the capacility (capacity+capability) for new competitive advantages founded the practical value of human intellectual assets.

Human resources in the knowledge era have to be flexible and adaptable to a context where permanent dynamic change is the only constant; they have to become life-long learners to adapt to the fast pace of uncertain change by constantly replacing, renewing and upgrade their skills and knowledge for the new VUCA world characterized by volatility, uncertainty, complexity and ambiguity. In today’s dynamic realities, knowledge and skills rapidly become obsolete as knowledge and product cycles become increasingly smaller.

Learning Mastery

Learning curriculum in learning institutions can no longer just focus their students to solve past problems which most likely will never recur. Learning facilitators, especially teachers and University Professors, must reach out beyond comfortable legacy “ivory towers” to immerse with industry, businesses, community and society so as to maintain their continuous relevance with regard to the context of knowledge applications.

Given the explosion of knowledge and technology, it is no longer possible for learning institutions to teach its students all there is to know in order to be ready for the workplace. The human talent should be empowered to “learn to learn” and develop new social competencies conducive for the personal and professional creation of possible future worlds. These attitudes, knowledge and skills can only be learnt, not taught, in preparation for future possible worlds where new jobs have yet to be invented and challenges that are unimaginable today.

Learning to create the future involves cross-disciplinary and multi-disciplinary pedagogical and andragogical modalities within the knowledge structure and mode of inquiry of the respective disciplines.

Learning mastery will leverage more on analytical and problem-solving skills, and inter-personal and communication skills that will embolden and empower working with others and in concurrent diverse teams. Synergizing with the competencies of others increasingly make sense at a time where no single person has the ability to quickly identify and engage the subtle changes in the strategic operating environment for quick decisive actions.

The 6-Ship Journey to Create Possible Futures

The future is yet to be determined. Possible future worlds are created as we broaden learning curriculum and adopt fresh mental perspectives to nurture innovative mindware. Embolden by being creative and entrepreneurial, human talents are able to invent new ideas and products that will create uncontested markets and embrace new customers. The result is to broaden the human talent impact on businesses, community and society, as they embark on the following 6 “ships” on the awesome journey of futures creation that is within their grasp:

(1) Scholarship: The creation and application of knowledge, with an emphasis on critical scholarly inquiry, research, empiricism, experimentation, investigation and creative production of innovations.

(2) Entrepreneurship: The creation of employment opportunities from discoveries, innovations and the creation of new business ventures.

(3) Citizenship: The ability to apply knowledge and skills for responsible community life and social action by committing to active engagement, political participation and long-term ethical purpose.

(4) Stewardship: The responsibility of every human talent is to carry out its unique role in society as stewards of knowledge and executor of beneficial actions. For this, the human talent has a deep appreciation and awareness that he/she is entrusted and embolden with the responsibilities that accompany talent.

(5) Leadership: This involves motivating fellow humans to take actions that would not otherwise have been taken. Leadership is measured by the extent to which an individual or groups of individuals can influence and energize the ideas, actions and capabilities of others toward the betterment of society, for the creation of a better future society.

(6) Partnership: This involves mobilising work collaboratively to address complex issues and problems. In the VUCA world, no talent can expect to be able to address issues and provide problem solutions by working in isolation. He/she can only be effective by interacting with others. Working in partnerships will obtain understanding and appreciation of what can be accomplished together with businesses, industry and the community that could not have been accomplished alone.

In closing, I recall then Singapore’s Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew (1923–2015) some 53 years ago when he addresses a Youth Leadership Meeting: “It is amazing the number of highly intelligent persons in the world who make no contribution at all to the well-being of their fellow-men” (Speech at a Conference on Youth and Leadership, 10 April 1967).

Making social impact by creating possible future worlds is the only goal of scholarship and learning in the human talent.